Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Conviction Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Sudbury / Windsor / Saskatoon, Canada · 2013

Canada: Basilian priest-teacher convicted after admitting abuse of dozens of students

Record class

Core record

Evidence status

Convicted

Authority role

Basilian priest, teacher and principal at Catholic schools

Organization

Basilian Fathers

Spiritual nexus

The victims were students at Catholic schools where the defendant's priesthood and teaching office were one authority; the institution's retention of him after repeated reports extended it.

  • Pastoral or clerical authority
  • Institutional obedience or isolation

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2013-01-01 · guilty plea and sentence; related civil awards

    Saskatchewan court, Canada. Fr William Hodgson 'Hod' Marshall, a Basilian priest-teacher who admitted abusing dozens of boys across a 38-year career at multiple Catholic schools, was convicted on a guilty plea for assaults on two Saskatoon boys (1959, 1961), receiving a six-month conditional sentence. He had been reported six times over his career yet retained. Civil courts later awarded individual survivors multi-million-dollar judgments. Dismissed from the priesthood by Pope Benedict XVI in 2013; died 2014.

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • priest-teacher authority over students across a 38-year career
  • retention in role despite six reports

Primary record

Sources

national newspaper court reporting verdict and civil awards report SooToday / Sudbury.com, reporting the conviction and subsequent civil awards (2013–2021).

Reports the plea, sentence, laicisation and civil judgments.

Related record

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