Anglican sexual abuse case confirms liability issue raised by Layman The Layman Online Thursday, October 7,1999 A 5,000-member Anglican diocese in the Canadian province of British Columbia may face bankruptcy if it is forced to pay major damages as a result of a series of court cases on sexual abuse, according to a story by Ecumenical News International. The story confirms legal liability issues raised by The Presbyterian Layman in 1997, when presbyteries in the Presbyterian Church (USA) voted on an overture that was intended to lift the constitutional ban on ordaining self-affirming, practicing homosexuals in the denomination. The presbyteries defeated the overture by nearly 2-1, but there have been subsequent attempts to allow practicing homosexuals to serve as deacons, elders and ministers. The 1997 Layman analysis, by Robert L. Howard, chairman of the board of the Presbyterian Lay Committee, raised the specter that without standards governing conduct by the leadership, the denomination and individual congregations could find themselves liable to large damage claims. That's what has happened in the Anglican Diocese in British Columbia, where the province's Supreme Court has ruled that the diocese and the federal government of Canada were jointly liable for compensation to Floyd Mowatt, who was sexually abused 30 years ago at a church residential school. Anglican officials told Ecumenical News that if the judge repeats the action in additional claims, the diocese could become bankrupt. In an analysis published in the September/October 1997 edition of The Layman, Howard said, "Under standard legal principles, corporations and institutional entities, including churches, are liable for injuries or harm caused by their officers or employees of the entity if their conduct was within the course and scope of their employment or official duties. Sexual misconduct and harassment cases are burgeoning throughout the United States, and plaintiffs' attorneys almost always seek to impose liability on entities above or behind the perpetrator of the offending conduct in order to recover more substantial damages." If the ban on ordaining homosexuals were lifted, Howard contended, the denomination could be considered as endorsing homosexual activity and therefore liable if a Presbyterian officer's homosexual advances damaged a parishioner. The Anglican Journal has estimated that the damages in the British Columbia case were about $200,000 in Canadian dollars ($135,000 US). The diocese has enough money to pay that claim, but not to pay four additional claims of the same amount which are likely to be awarded quickly, according to Ecumenical News International. The British Columbia court said the diocese was 60 percent responsible for hiring a man who was later convicted for sexually assaulting children and that the government was 40 percent responsible for failing to monitor the private residential school were the incidents occurred. In his analysis, Howard, senior partner and chairman of Foulston & Siefkin, of Wichita, the largest law firm in Kansas, raised two concerns about protecting against liability in sexual harassment and sexual abuse cases: 1) the need for a strong policy against such conduct and 2) the enforcement of that policy.

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