Support seems to be growing for a federal inquiry into the handling, or mishandling of the Fenwick MacIntosh sex abuse case.
It took years to bring the Nova Scotia business man to trial on sex offences.
In the end his convictions were tossed out because it took so long.
Now there’s a new voice adding to the cries for a federal inquiry.
Roger Cuzner, the Liberal Member of Parliament for Cape Breton Canso has written to newly-minted Justice Minister Peter MacKay, saying Nova Scotia’s representative in Ottawa knows the file better than anyone in the Harper Government.
“When we spoke in the spring about it,” Cuzner explains. “He and I, and Rob Nicholson, he understands the gravity of this case. Now that he’s in charge, I think it will be a quick ramp-up for him.”
In April, the Supreme Court of Canada rejected the Crown’s appeal, of an earlier decision by a lower court, to throw out multiple sex offence convictions against MacIntosh, for abusing boys in the Port Hawkesbury area in the 1970’s.
The reason it took too long to extradite MacIntosh from India.
One of the victims says since that decision, his life has spiraled downward and he is currently staging a hunger strike.
“If I had have known what was going to take place,” says Weldon MacIntosh-Reynolds. “I would have never, ever, ever have come forward. Now that I have come forward, and everything that has taken place, I’ve lost everything in my life.”
When the Supreme Court quashed the appeal, it seemed like the end of the line for victims and their decades-long fight.
MacIntosh-Reynolds says the mounting calls for a federal inquiry are giving him at least another glimmer of hope.
He says Peter MacKay called him last week.
“He said that he knows that we want answers,” explains MacIntosh-Reynolds. “I told him that regardless of what happens, I feel the victims should be compensated for the mis-justice that has been done here.”
CTV News contacted Peter MacKay's office.
“The delays in the case under the previous Liberal government were unacceptable," replies the Minister's office. "The file stands very prominently on Peter MacKay’s agenda."
MacIntosh-Reynolds and Rodger Cuzner say they’re confident the Minister will act on the file.
“Canadians want to know what went wrong here,” says Cuzner. “They want to make sure steps are taken to make sure this never happens to anybody again.”
Both men add that if a federal inquiry takes place, it should happen with participation from the Nova Scotia Government.
With files from CTV Atlantic’s Ryan MacDonald
