Posted on 07/31/2002 5:27:17 AM PDT by Lorenb420
MONTREAL -- Opposition MPs called on Youth Minister Ethel Blondin-Andrew to explain her role in the aftermath of an alleged sexual assault in which Prime Minister Jean Chrétien's son, Michel, is charged.
The MPs said the RCMP may have to examine her actions.
The justice critics for the Progressive Conservatives and the Canadian Alliance said yesterday that Ms. Blondin-Andrew, the MP for Western Arctic and Secretary of State for Children and Youth, owes the public a full explanation of her conversations with the mother of the alleged victim. (The mother cannot be identified, to protect her daughter's identity.)
The mother of the 18-year-old woman has said she felt Ms. Blondin-Andrew was pressing her to not lay charges against Michel Chrétien, 33, after her daughter told her she had been sexually assaulted during a night of heavy drinking at his Yellowknife apartment.
She said that the minister, a long-time acquaintance, phoned three times, warned that a trial could smear her family's reputation in the news media and offered to pay to send family members to a healing circle.
This week, Ms. Blondin-Andrew's lawyer, Ray Santini, confirmed that the minister spoke to the alleged victim's mother but denied that she applied pressure. He said the allegations are "completely unfounded."
But Tory justice critic Peter MacKay said the allegations are so serious that Ms. Blondin-Andrew must come forward with a full explanation because even making the call was an error in judgment.
"I think she owes a duty now," he said, "because we've only got one version of the story."
Mr. MacKay, a former prosecutor, said that he does not know whether the version recounted by the mother is accurate, but Canadians should have a full accounting directly from the minister. He said the RCMP might have to examine the case further.
"If I heard this and I was working as a Crown prosecutor, I would want the police to go out and take a statement from the . . . mother. That's the least that should happen," he said.
"If she said what she is alleged to have said, then at best it's intimidation, and at worst, it's obstruction of justice."
Canadian Alliance critic Vic Toews also called on Ms. Blondin-Andrew to make a "formal statement" and said the RCMP should examine her actions.
He said the minister appears to have shown bad judgment in even calling the mother, and should have spoken to prosecutors or victims'-services workers first to ensure there would be no perception or hint of undue influence.
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Not sure, but I picture a bunch of people in a circle singing kum-bye-ah (sp?) :)
Anyway, it should be very easy to prove whether three phone calls were made from one number to another on the night in question. One call could be explained away, since the women knew one another. If there were in fact three, I would tend to believe the mother's version.
Is this some sort of re-education camp? Along with the lawyers, kill the psychologists.
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