Canadian Armed Forces – Page 21

Power Engineering

I’m a 4th class power engineer. I started off as a 5th class power engineer back in 2002.

Power engineering isn’t what I wanted, but it was what as available to me if I wanted to finally get away from wages that had me just treading above welfare.

I was working for a property management firm in Vancouver at the time doing building maintenance. Pump repairs, chiller maintenance, building automation, etc.

I wasn’t trade qualified and I didn’t have a red seal. But what I had was an ability to read and comprehend service manuals and parts diagrams. I could read schematics and I understood electrical safety.

So, if I didn’t want to be a power engineer, why am I a power engineer.

As I’ve alluded to previously, my father didn’t give a shit about school. To my father my teachers and principals were all stunned cunts, stupid fucking cocksuckers, and fucking assholes. My teachers were forever sticking their noses into his fucking business. They were calling him at work and disturbing him. My academic problems were obviously caused by their fucking inability to teach.

When I left school at the start of grade nine, he didn’t give a fuck in the slightest. I just had to pay him $100.00 per month to stay in my room, otherwise I’d have to move out. Which I did in the winter of 1988.

Even if I had stayed in school, trade school, college, or even university would have not been options for me.

As I would discover later in life, Richard joined the Royal Canadian Navy in 1963 with a low mark grade 9 education which he had to upgrade before the RCN would admit him in 1963.

He sailed the world, he learned trade skills, he learned to fly aircraft.

Not bad for a prairie boy from a one room school house in Fort McMurray, AB.

He did all of this without a university education, nor a college degree, nor any type of trade school.

Even though I have my grade 12 GED, I’ve always downplayed what that means.

Before I was allowed to apply for the 5th class power engineer program at BCIT I was required to take a couple of tests to prove that my mathematical skills were at least at the grade 10 level.

I passed my 5th class power engineering course.

Called and let Richard know.

Didn’t give a fuck in the slightest.

I accumulated sufficient time as a 5th class power engineer to challenge the 4th class power engineer provincial exam.

I passed that with ease.

Called Richard and let him know.

Just like the last time, he didn’t give a fuck.

In September of 2005 I was hired at the physical plant at the hospital and I called Richard to let him know.

Absolutely didn’t give a fuck. He didn’t need a union in the Canadian Forces so why the hell do I need a union? He then said that I was still dumber than my younger brother who he was sure was making more money than I was and he worked in a “cardboard box factory” making more money doing far less. So it was obvious that I wasn’t the smart one.

This is what led to me leaving all of the messages with Richard in August of 2006.

Now, to be honest, power engineering has provided me with employment at a wage that wouldn’t normally be available to a “loser” like me.

So, what is a power engineer?

A power engineer is someone who has been granted a certificate of competency to operate and be in charge of a refrigeration plant or a steam plant / heating plant of up to a specific heat exchanger surface areas.

This includes inspecting the entire plant once per day, minor maintenance, adjustment of equipment, checking fluid levels, maintaining chemical levels, and ensuring that the equipment is operating at peak performance in a safe manner.

In the hospital this also involves responding to fire alarms, conducting elevator extractions, testing the generators and fire pumps, diagnosing minor refrigeration issues, filter changes on the supply fans.

And in 2019 I was promoted to chief engineer.

I go well far above and beyond what a power engineer is required to do.

Don’t forget, power engineers have a “certificate of competency”, not a “trade qualification” or an “inter-provincial red seal”.

I can troubleshoot the building automation system down to component level. I’ve installed networked temperature monitoring equipment for logging the temperatures of medical and pharmaceutical refrigeration.
I upgraded the chemical monitoring systems for all of the cooling towers.
I was responsible for having all of the major supply fans converted from variable pitch mechanisms over to fixed pitch hubs with variable speed drives.
I was responsible for replacing close to 60 older pneumatic HVAC mixing boxes in the laboratory area with newer electronic mixing boxes.
I put in the current fuel monitoring system that automatically calls in the refuelling company when certain fuel levels are attained.
I pushed to have the four main cooling tower replaced in 2016 when after 25 years of neglect the old towers were a liability to the hospital.
I just finished the upgrade of the building automation system in Phase 1 Level 4 to replace the old Honeywell Excel Plus system that could no longer be serviced.
I implemented tablets for rounds and readings software.
I implemented the Angus mobile software for the aforementioned tablets for tracking of work orders.

So, why don’t I feel happy?

I’ve known for a very long time that this isn’t the line of work that I wanted to be in. And I don’t mean being the chief engineer at work. I mean being in hands on mechanical / electronics type work.

The key to this was in my social service records.

“When asked why Robert likes computers and electronics, he said that he wants to learn this so he can be closer to his father”

Fuck was I ever a damn idiot back then.

At work I find that playing stupid is the best way. Most of the power engineers that I supervise have no mechanical, electrical, or electronic skills. And one thing that I’ve had to learn in life is that if someone doesn’t have a mechanical intuition they will never learn mechanics. If I need something done I either do it myself or I contract it out.

I liken a power engineering certificate to a driver’s licence.

A driver’s licence states that you are qualified to operate a motor vehicle. A driver’s licence does not vouch for the mechanical aptitude of the car driver. Some car drivers can drop their own blocks and rebuild the big end and press a new oil seal, while some car drivers can’t even top up their own windshield washer fluid without nearly killing themselves.

With power engineering it’s the same thing.
Some power engineers know how to weld.
Some know how to wire electric motors.
Some know how to press bearings onto shafts.
Some can understand digital logic, and understand control signal and feedback while other power engineers can’t even bring up task manager on Windows or know how to check for +15, -15, +24, +5, and -5 volts on a connector that is clearly labeled.

But Bobbie, if you don’t like this stuff, why do you keep doing it?

Simple.

As a kid I tried to win my father’s affection, which as it turns out was a lost cause.

When I moved out of the house when I was 16, I had two things going for me. My mechanical intuition and my skills in electronics.

These two abilities ensured that I had employment when otherwise I would have probably endured a life on the streets with my grade 8 education and my mental illnesses.

I scratched and clawed my way up through industries that I never should have worked for but they were willing to overlook my mental issues and my lack of formal education in trade for putting my mechanical and electronic skills to use.

What could I have been if Richard had just given the slightest of a fuck (and if CFB Namao hadn’t occurred)?

I liked theatre and play production at school. At Elia Jr. High and at Pierre Laporte Jr. High I worked on lighting for plays and I did sound setup and sound mixing. Pretty well the same thing at Pierre Laporte. I did sound and lighting for school productions. I repaired the old 20 channel dimming panel. Needed a whole bunch of new trials to replace the ones that had burnt out due to shorts in the fixtures.

Theatrics would have been interesting.

Theatrics would have cost a shit ton of money to get into and a lot of support from home, so realistically theatrics would never have been an option.

Working on cars? Nope, I’ve always hated cars. I’ve owned cars for 7 years of my 35 years of holding a driver’s licence.

So, I go to work everyday.

What else am I going to do?

Am I going to quit my job and retire after I win mad-mad-money in my class action? Fuck no. If I walk away with $30k from that whole fiasco I will be greatly surprised. This is the Government of Canada that I’m dealing with, not the Catholic Church.

But Bobbie…… lots of people hate their jobs.

Well, lots of people love their jobs.

Anyways…….. until next posting.

Makeup……..

Yeah, as per my previous posting, I did dabble with makeup for a few years.

I liked it.

Growing up in military communities as a child can be extremely stifling.

Back in the day “queers”, “fags”, “homos”, “lezzies”, etc. were not welcome in the Canadian Armed Forces.

This was enforced by Canadian Forces Administrative Order CFAO 19-20. Yes, CFAO 19-20 was not aimed at military dependents living on the bases, but it would have affected the attitudes of our serving parents towards anyone that appeared in the slightest to be a homosexual.

And housing communities on military bases made the boring conformity of the civilian suburbs look like outright anarchy in comparison.

Yeah, I understand that out in the civilian world, makeup and dresses on boys wouldn’t have been all that tolerated, but there were glimmers of hope.

In the defence community dresses and makeup on boys would have resulted in some pretty substantial beatings and corrective measures.

CFB Downsview was probably the closet to a tolerant base that I lived on, but that was more or less due to the fact that CFB Downsview was the base where military personnel went to finish off the last few years of their career until retirement.

So, after a childhood, adolescence, and adulthood of self loathing, why did I suddenly give in to my whims starting in 2006?

Well, first I had a union job. I wouldn’t have taken a chance with my previous employers finding out about my proclivities involving makeup and dresses.

Second, some co-workers from work from different departments invited me out to a pride event.

Now, to be honest that was the only pride event that I’ve ever been to in my life. There’s just way too much in the way of alcohol indulgence at these events for me to feel comfortable. And there’s way too much social interaction. I like to be left alone. And I don’t like to be touched. I still participate in fringe events at pride outside of the main events.

Anyways, after the party and on my way home I gave my father a few phone calls. All of these calls went to voice mail. But they must have hit a nerve as Richard called me the next morning.

The last time this fucker had called me on his own initiative was back around 1996 when he called me and told me that if I helped my brother fix his car that Richard would pay me. Richard never did.

Anyways, we talked for a long time when he called.

You have to remember that this was almost 5 years before I received my social service paperwork that contained the evaluation of Richard by the psychiatrist hired by the Canadian Armed Forces which stated that Richard took no responsibility for his family, blamed other for the problems with his family, and expected others to solve the problems with his family. This paperwork also contained evaluation from Alberta Social Services that Richard lied and Richard basically had two faces depending on the situation.

So, in 2006 I was totally unarmed in my discussion with Richard.

First, I had to understand that hiring the babysitter wasn’t his fault. It was his mother’s fault that the babysitter was hired. He told her not to hire P.S., but she wouldn’t listen to him. He knew the babysitter’s name. He blurted it out himself without any prodding.

He even managed to blame me again for the abuse by telling me that I let it go on for far too long, and that because I allowed my brother to be abused by the babysitter that I was to blame for the issues my brother was having.

Richard said that all I had to do was tell him or tell Grandma and they could have stopped the abuse. But because I had allowed the abuse to go on there were some concerns that I was a pervert like the babysitter.

Second, Grandma wouldn’t have had to come raise my brother and I if our mother wasn’t a whore that would spread her legs for anyone in uniform. Yes, he actually said that. He said that our mother ran away and she abandoned us, it wasn’t his fault. She knew he had a career in the Canadian Forces and that he wouldn’t be home a lot. He had no decision in the matter, when the Canadian Forces told him to go, he had to go.

Third, he really didn’t beat me as hard as I remembered that he did when my brother took the Pontiac Chevette for a joyride. And even if Richard did go a little to far that morning it was because he was under a lot of stress at the time from work and by me not keeping my brother under control I was just making matters worse for him.

He on his own brought up the matter of the Vectrex and the laser. Said that he couldn’t understand why I got so worked up about that. School was meant to go to, sit down, shut up, and look at the blackboard, not to be a show-off, who the fuck did I honestly think that I was trying to impress.

And of course he railed on and on about how he sacrificed everything for my brother and I and that we didn’t show him the least about of respect or appreciation.

It was at that time that I had begun to realize what an asshole my father really was and how I had wanted my entire life trying to make amends with a man who only cared about himself.

Even though I realized in 2006 just how horrific Richard really was, this didn’t (and never will) erase the memories of everything that I had lived through under his roof.

The more I wore makeup and the more I switched from “men’s” clothing to “women’s” clothing and went against the conventions that society considered “normal” for the genders, the more what my father and Terry had told me as a kid came back to haunt me.

I generally stopped wearing makeup around 2012. The whole previous year of dealing with the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service and the Military Police Complaints Commission sucked the fucking life right out of me.

And this was before I received a copy of the certified tribunal records in February of 2013 for my Application for Judicial Review.

Dealing with all of the stress and the lies and the intentional obfuscation pretty well killed any joy that I had with wearing makeup. I still get my nails done on occasion, but not to the extent that I used to before.

Maybe in a way my facial tattoos make up for the loss of my desire to wear makeup.

Wearing dresses and make up and my weird fashion sense have made me wonder what exactly I could have been in life had I not grown up in the circumstances that I grew up in.

I thought that everyone knew

When did Bobbie start wearing dresses?

I didn’t realize until December of 2013 when I tracked my mother down and went to see her in Calgary that I had slipped into my friend’s dresses once or twice on CFB Shearwater.

My father wasn’t around, so he never found out. Which was probably a very good thing.

The next time I wore dresses was actually on Canadian Forces Base Griesbach. I had a female friend. Her parents were very traditional in the sense that girls had to wear dresses. So she and I would slip off base, swap clothes, and hang around for a while. This of course was during the time I was in the care of military social worker Captain Terry Totzke for my “homosexuality”. So this would have been in the period of 1981 to 1983. Again, I don’t think my father ever knew.

There was an incident on CFB Griesbach that caused me a lot of conflict though. I knew it would have been after I was placed into the Westfield program by Alberta Social Services. Sue, my stepmother, was going to take my younger brother to Dairy Queen for ice cream. I asked Sue if I could come. Sue, who was only about 12 years older than me, looked at me and said “Retards don’t get ice cream”. She was obviously referring to my involvement with Westfield and the problems that my untreated depression, anxiety, and other issues were causing for my father and her. Anyways I started crying. She came over and grabbed me and looked me straight in the face and said that if I didn’t stop crying like a little girl that she was going to take me to Sears and buy me a dress and that I could cry like a little girl all I wanted too.

This caused me great conflict for three reasons. 1) I hated being called a retard. I was getting teased and taunted enough on base having to take the short yellow bus to school, but now my own stepmother was calling me a retard. 2) I despised [brother] for how he could cause all sorts of shit in the house but it was always my fault for not looking after him. 3) I really wanted a dress. I was kinda hooked on Alice’s dress from Alice in Wonderland.

As things had become way out of control at home with Richard and Sue and as Richard was blaming me for “fucking with his military career” and dishing out the physical abuse to go along with that, my desires for dresses took a back seat.

The only type of glimmer that I had in my teenage years of the fascination I had with dresses as a kid was when I went to see Ridley Scott’s Legend in the theatres. I wanted Lilli’s “Black Evil Dress”.

It wouldn’t be until I had my first apartment in New Westminster around 1995 that I started to buy dresses on the sly and wear them in my apartment.

Because of my time with Captain Totzke and my father’s attitude I knew that this was probably due to my “homosexual perversion”.

It wouldn’t be until I got my union job at St. Paul’s in 2005 that I really got into dresses. First it was skirts. Skirts that could conceivably pass as “kilts”.

But by 2008 I was mainly wearing dresses.

My wardrobe at this point is mainly dresses and skirts. I do own a couple “utilikilts” and one pair of jeans.

Why do I wear dresses?

I think that on CFB Shearwater it was just childhood curiosity. When you’re under 5 I don’t think that you have a clear understanding of societal gender roles. Don’t forget, it was very common up until the early 1900s for boys under the age of 7 or 8 to wear dresses. When a boy turned 7 or 8 they were “breeched” and given their first pair of trousers / pants as well as their first haircut. Toilet training and the lack of mass produced clothing would account for this.

This is Franklin Delano Roosevelt wearing a dress.

Historians have had to go back and reevaluate paintings from the Medieval and Early Modern Eras as a lot of the paintings depicting girls in dresses may have actually been both boys and girls in dresses. To tell the two apart boys tended to wear plain dresses while girl’s dresses tended to have small amounts of finery attached to the dress.

But I think that from CFB Griesbach and onwards my desire for wearing dresses had more to do with my gender identity having been destroyed by my sexual abuse on CFB Namao along with the “conversion therapy” that I was receiving from Captain Terry Totzke on CFB Griesbach.

At the time my IQ was evaluated using a professional psychiatric test. I was evaluated to have an IQ of 136 +/- 6.

Maybe this figured into my desire to wear dresses. Dresses don’t have genders. They’re clothing.

As Richard would often say, maybe I was too fucking smart for my own fucking good.

You don’t become a woman by wearing a dress anymore than a woman becomes a man by wearing pants.

Don’t forget, but society heavily frowned upon women wearing pants right up until WWII when women were then required to work on the assembly lines to build weapons and aircraft.

Dresses are comfortable and easy to wear.

And the less things I have touching my body, the happier I am.

I think the destruction of my gender identity also figures into my desire to wear dresses.

I don’t identify as male or female.

I have no desire to be a woman.

But I also don’t fit into society’s definition of a man.

Therefore I’ve never felt locked into society’s demands that I wear specific clothing.

I have no attraction to women, but I also have no attraction to men.

I have had sex with both earlier on in my life.

During the late ‘80s and into the ‘90s I was mainly with men, but it always felt mechanical.

But don’t let this sound like I was involved with 1,000s or partners.

Maybe about 10 guys total.

Maybe about 2 or 3 women.

And I haven’t been with anyone since the early 2000’s

My attraction to men is stymied by the fact that I’ve lived all my life with the knowledge that homosexuality is a mental illness and that it is inherently evil. Having sex with men always brings back memories of my father, of Terry, and of [baby sitter / accomplice]. This cannot be escaped.

My attraction to women is stymied by the fact that I’m not really attracted to women.

What am I?

I identify as “queer”. Not gay. Not bi. Not straight. Not trans.

Just queer.

Maybe I am gay, but unfortunately that was taken away from me back in ’78 through ’83.

When I legally changed my name in 2008 I chose Bobbie specifically because this is the unisex spelling of this name.

Bobby = male

Bobbi = female

Bobbie = unisex.

I hated the name Robert as this is a boy’s / man’s name.

Anyways……………..

The fact is I wear dresses ‘cause I like dresses and I don’t identify with either gender.

A train trip.

Well, it was last week that I arrived back in Vancouver after my Vancouver to Toronto and back train trip on VIA.

Twas an interesting four days out and four days back.

I stayed in Toronto one night.

As I said before, this trip was supposed to be to allow me to reflect on my application for Medical Assistance in Dying that I was originally going to apply for on March 20th, 2023 before the government caved into the demands of astroturf campaigns funded by American evangelical dark money.

I turned this trip into a chance to get some writing done on my book.

There were two spots that I could sit down and write.

Between 2nd breakfast and 2nd supper I could use my berth as it was configured during the day as two seats and I could ask for the portable “games” table to be set up.

My other favourite location to write was up front in the “economy class” “games” room. This was an area in the starlight dome car that was set up with six tables.

I actually managed to get the layout of the book figured out along with how I want the chapters to work. Whether I have time to publish this book before I take my leave is the unknown. I’d like to at least see this book in print, but I’m not going to hold my breath.

I’ve always had bladder issues with difficulty getting to sleep due to a constant “not empty” feeling, so I took the lower berth which as it turned out had the advantage of having the window.

This is what the berths look like converted to “sleeping mode”

There’s a very heavy curtain that covers both openings. The top berth has a ladder.

The berths are actually quite roomy considering that they only exist between 2nd supper and 2nd breakfast.

The porters on each sleeping car have to assemble and disassemble these berths twice per day and convert them between sleeping berths and the dual chairs. Make sure you tip these people at the end of the ride.

I didn’t spend as much time taking pictures as I thought that I would. I didn’t even spend all that much time in the dome of the Park at the end of the train where the Sleeper + class were supposed to hang out and mingle.

There are three classes on the train.

Economy class is basically just regular seats with no sleeping accommodations.

Sleeper class has two different types of sleeping arrangements. Berths, semi-private rooms, or private rooms.

And then there is the Prestige class in which the rooms are like private hotel rooms.

Berths in sleeper class is what I could afford, so it’s what I got.

Not too bad of a deal either as you get three really good meals per day.

But yeah, writing is what I did.

And it was enjoyable.

No interruptions

No distractions.

Nothing but me and my keyboard.

I felt more at home in the economy class as everyone up there more or less kept to themselves. I never felt welcome back in the park car, not due to my tattoos or my dresses, but because I didn’t partake in “small talk” and I didn’t share their politics.

Riding VIA rail you discover just how bad the politicians have fucked this country. There are thousands of towns along the rail lines with no passenger bus service and absolutely no low fare air service. Key markets for rail passenger service.

The problem is that companies like CN Rail, albeit Canadian in name, are heavily owned by foreign shareholders that really don’t give a rat’s ass about allowing VIA to have access to the rails for passenger service.

You often hear the argument that Canada is just too large for rail passenger service.

Canada is smaller than Northern Africa. Canada is roughly a little larger than Australia. Over 75% of Canada’s population exists between Hamilton ON and Montreal, PQ. Over 95% of Canada’s population lives within 100 km of the US Border.

Yes, on a Mercator projection map, Canada looks like a very large landmass. But the Earth is a sphere, not an 11×17 sheet of paper. When you take a sphere and flatten in out, everything at the equator of that sphere will somewhat be correct in size, but the close you get to the poles of that now flattened sphere everything gains massive errors in horizontal distances. Vertical distances stay correct, horizontal distances become more wrong the further away from the equator they are. A proper globe projection will show you just how small Canada actually is.

Try this: https://www.thetruesize.com/

If politicians wanted passenger rail service from one side of the country to the other they could easily implement it. But then they’d have to endure the ire of the automobile industry, the petroleum industry, and the aviation industries. All three of which wouldn’t exist without massive tax payer subsidies to make their operations and their products affordable.

So what you end up with is the VIA trains sitting on sidings waiting for freight trains to go past. The rule used to be, and it still actually is, that passenger service had the right-of-way, but with lack of enforcement and freight trains becoming far too long for the siding, the passenger trains are stuck waiting.

But enough about politics.

I had time to reflect upon the irony that even though I am the representative plaintiff in my class action against the DND and the CAF over the Captain Father Angus McRae affair that I stand a very good chance of not collecting a single red cent from the action.

This comes down to the fact that in 1980 the “brass” within the Canadian Armed Forces didn’t want the babysitter handed over to the RCMP, nor did the CAF JAG want the CFSIU to spend any time truly investigating the babysitter for what he had done.

What that means is that even though most of the 25 children that Captain McRae was suspected of molesting were also being molested by Captain McRae’s teenaged accomplice, and most of the children being molested by Captain McRae were being supplied to Captain McRae by his teenaged accomplice, the Department of Justice and the Canadian Armed Forces are only willing to compensate victims of Captain McRae himself.

Does this mean that in all of my persistence for justice I’ve just set the babysitter up as being the only person to receive any type of settlement from my class action?

And there’s no doubt in my mind that the DOJ and the DND will point to the 2011 CFNIS investigation to show that there was no connection between the babysitter and I, therefore there could be no possible connection between Captain McRae and myself.

This even though the CFNIS in 2011 had the 1980 CFSIU investigation paperwork and the 1980 Court Martial transcripts that heavily implicated the babysitter with molesting numerous children on the base and it was the investigation of the babysitter by the base military police that uncovered the Captain Father Angus McRae military child sexual abuse scandal which DND quickly moved out of the public eye.

Yes, sure, the CFNIS should never have been involved with investigating my complaint against the babysitter.

Yes, sure, two independent reviews by retired supreme court judges found that the CFNIS are incompetent and out of their league when it comes to sexual assault investigations.

That doesn’t matter.

The DOJ and the DND need to prove that I wasn’t connected to Captain McRae so that they can show the public that if I am making things up about being involved with the babysitter and Captain McRae, then what else am I making up? Maybe everything that I’ve said about the “Summary Investigation Flaw”, and the “3-year-time-bar flaw” is also a lie.

When no one believes.

Well, it looks as if one of the aspects of the CFB Namao child sexual abuse scandal that the DOJ and the DND aren’t willing to look after is the psychological harm done to the victims of Captain Father Angus McRae and his teenaged accomplice.

And I’m not referring to the psychological harm done as a direct result of the sexual abuse. I’m talking about the psychological malpractice that came from being dealt with by military social workers.

It’s very clear from my involvement with the military social worker that his goal was to keep the civilian authorities from discovering what had occurred on Canadian Forces Base Namao from 1978 until 1980.

How many other kids were dealt with by military social workers in the aftermath of the Captain Father Angus McRae child sexual abuse scandal?

No one knows.

I’ve tried to retrieve my medical records from Captain Terry Totzke, but the Department of National Defence says that these records cannot be found unless I myself tell DND where these records currently are and who currently has them.

If it wasn’t for my Alberta Social Service records and my Children’s Aid Society of Toronto records, I would never have know that I had been in the care of military social workers in Alberta and in Ontario.

And no doubt there are others like me.

Others who were dealt with by the military social workers.

Others who were blamed by the military social workers for wanting what happened.

Other who were blamed for their younger siblings having been abused by the babysitter and Captain McRae.

How many kids from Canadian Forces Base Namao went on to commit suicide?

Not only as a result of the sexual abuse in a military environment that viewed such abuse as nothing more than homosexuality.

How many kids involved with the CFB Namao child sexual abuse scandal went on to commit suicide due to their involvement with the military social workers and their serving parent’s refusal to disobey the directions of the military social workers.

The DOJ and the DND will do anything to keep the public from ever discovering that not only were children sexually abused on military bases, but children were often mindfucked and gaslit by the military.

This means that my application for M.A.i.D. is going to be one hell of a battle.

One of the complication my nurse practitioner says that I might still face in my request for Medical Assistance in Dying is that I haven’t sought or participated in treatment for my mental illnesses.

In May of 2021 I had to take time off from work. I was in crisis. The stress of dealing with my past along with the stress of dealing with a major hospital that was trying to become COVID proof using ventilation systems that were designed long before viruses like SARS or COVID pushed me over the edge.

I went to see a psychiatrists at Vancouver General Hospital at their Access and Assessment Program.

I had a talk with one of the psychiatrists.

As I listed off to him what I was going through and what I had been through, I could see his eyes glaze over. He must have literally been wondering what fucking rock I crawled out from under and why I wasn’t wearing my tinfoil hat.

It’s the same look I’ve had from counsellors and psychiatrists before.

A look of complete disbelief.

A look that says that they think I am unloading 100 percent horseshit on them.

Military child sexual abuse?

Get the fuck outta here!

Military hiding child sexual abuse?

Get the fuck outta here!

Children with Military Social Workers?

Get the fuck outta here!

Children being gaslit by military social workers into believing that they’re to blame for being sexually abused?

Get the fuck outta here!

So yeah, it’s hard to get help when those offering the help don’t believe 1/10th of what you’re telling them.

And it’s absolutely maddening to think that I won’t be able to obtain M.A.i.D. because everyone who should have helped instead wanted to pass me off as some tinfoil hat lunatic.

So, it looks like I might be left with taking care of things by myself.

But that’s the way it has always been all of my life.

The fucking irony of ironies.

Hold on to you fucking hats boys and girls………

Guess who might not see a single red fucking cent from his class action brought against the Canadian Armed Forces.

I kid you not.

Even if the DOJ goes ahead and settles this matter out of court, I might not see a single nickel from the action.

See, even though the babysitter had been groomed by Canadian Armed Forces officer Captain Father Angus McRae. And even though the babysitter had been recommended to families such as mine by Captain Father Angus McRae in his role as padre for the base. And even though Captain McRae was using the babysitter to bring us young children over to the rectory attached to the chapel. And even though the chain of command made decisions to not bring the RCMP to deal with the babysitter and the horrific crimes he committed against the children living on the base, the Government is arguing that the babysitter was not a member of the Canadian Forces and that Captain McRae had no real authority over the babysitter and therefore the Government of Canada is not responsible to compensate those who were only abused by the babysitter.

But Bobbie, didn’t you say that the babysitter had taken you over to the chapel on five different occasions and that at Captain McRae’s request he gave you a “sickly sweet grape juice” which was later determined to be wine?

Well, because the CFNIS never undertook that investigative path in 2011 after I told the CFNIS about the visits to the chapel, there was never any investigation into this.

And the CFSIU investigation paperwork from 1980 doesn’t help much as the military police and the CFSIU conceded during their investigations that they had only touched the tip of the iceberg, that not all of the parents on Canadian Forces Base Name wanted their children associated with the obvious taint that would have come from being a male victim of male-on-male sexual abuse and so they wouldn’t let their children be interviewed by the investigators.

And then there’s that fact the some of Captain McRae’s abuse victims along with the victims of the babysitter had moved off the base during the summer of 1979 posting season and weren’t around to be interviewed by the military police and the CFSIU in May of 1980 when the babysitter’s activities along with Captain McRae’s activities became know to the military police, the CFSIU, and the base chain of command.

Am I angry?

nope.

Am I upset?

nope.

Am I surprised?

nope.

I’ve spent the last 12 years learning about the military justice system.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the Canadian Armed Forces are literally fucked seven ways from Sunday.

It’s an organization, that while not brimming full of child molesters and pedophiles, will do anything it can to not own up to the fact that its twisted and broken “justice system” as well as its self-interested parochial chain of command knew that there were pedophiles and child molesters praying on military dependents but was happy to look the other way so as not to create a public relations nightmare.

I can’t ever see the Department of National Defence or the Canadian Armed Forces owning up to and fixing this mess. They don’t have to. They’re so fucking untouchable that they never have to worry.

They’re not legally obligated to look after military dependents.

Ethically, sure. Legally, no.

Again, look at how the Canadian Armed Forces fucked over the 12 to 18 year old Army Cadets from Canadian Forces Base Valcartier in 1974 from the “grenade incident”. The only people in the room who received any type of help when a grenade detonated were the regular force members who were negligent in their duties and allowed the grenade in to the barracks and allowed the cadets to handle and play with it.

From 1974 until 2011 the Canadian Armed Forces told the victims and the families of the victims who died to basically fuck off and go pound sand due to the civilian nature of the cadets. The DND and the CAF weren’t legally responsible, the kids were on the base at their own risk.

Finally in 2011 the Ombudsman released a scathing report that chastised the Canadian Forces for compensating the negligent members of the Canadian Forces who allowed the bloodshed to occur while at the same time ignoring the death, pain, and suffering that the cadets aged 12 to 18 endured.

And that’s where I am at along with all of the other victims of the babysitter.

So far as General W.D. EYRE and the rest of the chain of command at National Defence Head Quarters are concerned, the child victims of Captain Father Angus McRae and his teenaged accomplice can go fuck themselves in the politest of terms.

To men such as General W.D. EYRE and even women such as Minister of National Defence Anita Anand are concerned the children from Canadian Forces Base Name and the other bases that Captain McRae served at are just collateral damage that must be endured in order to keep the image of the Canadian Armed Forces unblemished.

A potential road block.

I’m already not liking some of the “safe guards” that seem to be in place. See, as MAiD was never legalized for mental health issues agencies such as Vancouver Coastal Health were never able to give me any information on MAiD for reasons of mental health.

They could give me all of the information I needed to understand the procedure such as where I could undergo the procedure. The drugs involved with the procedure. What I would potentially feel during the procedure. And what would happen to my body after the procedure.

But what they could never give me information on was how a person with mental illness would apply to the program.

So when Canadian Senator states that “People who request & receive approval for MAID MD-SUMC will have received a substantial amount of different kinds of mental health care for a long time and found that nothing could alleviate their intolerable suffering.” this causes me great concern.

In the aftermath of being sexually abused on Canadian Forces Base Namao for 1-1/2 years I was placed into the care of Canadian Armed Forces social worker Captain Terry Totzke.

In November of 1980 I was diagnosed as suffering from major depression, severe anxiety, haphephobia. It was noted that I was terrified of being killed by my father.

Yet, I never received help with these issues.

Instead Captain Totzke was adamant that I had a mental illness called “homosexuality”. I receive 2-1/2 years of conversion therapy for this “illness”.

Even when Alberta Social Services were called in to deal with my brother and I, Captain Totzke still wouldn’t allow me to receive treatment for my issues.

Even when my issues had become so bad that my civilian social workers said that I required immediate psychiatric institutionalization, Captain Totzke wouldn’t comply.

At home, things were not good. My father had a very hair trigger temper. And if Captain Totzke told master corporal Gill that his son’s only problem is that he’s a homosexual, you can imagine that Richard wasn’t too concerned about my issues.

In fact, Richard’s response to my depression and my anxiety or even my haphephobia was a back hand, a slap, the belt, no supper, etc.

In April of 1983 we suddenly, and without warning, moved from Canadian Forces Base Griesbach in Edmonton to Canadian Forces Base Downsview in Toronto. At the time my father told me that we were moving because the counsellors wanted to give me drugs to help me stop being sexually attracted to other boys. I would learn in 2011 that the actual truth was Captain Totzke was helping my father flee the jurisdiction of Alberta as Alberta Social Services wanted to remove me from the home and place me into either foster care or residential care.

I suffered my entire life from the demons of depression, anxiety, as well as gender and orientation issues.

I never sought help with these issues as my father and Captain Totzke had both drilled into my head that I was a homosexual and that I just loved to seek attention and that’s why I was acting the way I did.

It wouldn’t be until August of 2011 that I had discovered the truth. The truth that I had been unfairly blamed for what had occurred on Canadian Forces Base Namao and that I had suffered with major depression, severe anxiety, haphephobia, and a plethora of other mental health issues.

It’s not my fault that I never received treatment.

It’s not my fault that I never sought treatment.

Even when I became aware of these issues in August of 2011 whenever I tried to seek treatment counsellors were very confused as to why I had a military social worker and why my father never got me treatment.

I am hoping that in the end that bypasses are put into the M.A.i.D. legislation that allow for extenuating circumstances to be taken into consideration. I would really hate to be told that I don’t deserve to undergo M.A.i.D. due to the decisions that the Canadian Forces chain of command made when I was 8 years old.

Our institutions are hopelessly fucking broken.

After my disastrous dealings with Warrant Officer Blair Hart in July of 2011, and at the urging of two different retired Judge Advocate Generals, I tried to enlist the help of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police service.

It was up to this point in my life that I had believed that the “outside civilian police” that were required to deal with the babysitter from CFB Namao was the Edmonton Police Service.

It was the two ex-JAGs that I spoke with that corrected me and told me that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are the outside civilian police force that is supposed to investigate matters on base that solely involve civilians such as myself and the babysitter.

In this case it would be the RCMP in Morinville, Alberta that were the RCMP detachment responsible for investigating civilian matters on Canadian Forces Base Namao.

I contacted the RCMP in Morinville and I was put in contact with corporal French.

Corporal French took my information down, but nothing seemed to go anywhere.

A little while later I had filed an Access to Information Request with the RCMP in which I was looking specifically for information related to May through July of 1980 and any involvement that the RCMP may have had with the Canadian Forces over the mater of Captain McRae and his teenaged accomplice.

Well, I received something that I would have never imagined. I received the incident report written by corporal French in which he notes that he had a conversation with Warrant Officer Blair Hart.

CFNIS member Warrant officer Blair Hart told RCMP corporal French, and this is ahead of the CFNIS contacting ANY of the witnesses or other victims, that the investigation into my complaint “was unlikely to go anywhere as a result of a lack of evidence”.

This was basically what Warrant Officer Blair Hart told me on July 18th, 2011. The CFNIS was apparently having trouble verifying the details of my complaint against PS. As we now know, the CFNIS knew what PS had done in 1980 as the CFNIS in 2011 had the CFSIU investigation paperwork and the court martial transcripts.

Anyways, corporal French wrote this in his notes:

Wow……. an “agenda”.

According to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, wanting to receive acknowledgement and justice for the hell I had been through on Canadian Forces Base Namao and Canadian Forces Base Griesbach was an “agenda”.

I made a complaint to the RCMP Complaints Commission.

The investigation of my complaint was conducted by Const Robb. Const Robb is what every RCMP officer should strive to be.

After I obtained a copy of Canadian Forces Administrative Order CFAO 2120-4-0 which stated that the CFNIS are always supposed to hand off any investigation solely involving civilians to the outside civilian police force having jurisdiction I started off another round of letter to RCMP “K” Division.

This ended up with another complaint to the RCMP complaints commission in 2017

Excerpt from Canadian Forces Administrative Order CFAO 2120-4-0

The reason that the civilian police are supposed to investigate matters involving only civilians is that civilian victims are unable to receive victim services and other help from the Canadian Armed Forces.

We now know why the CFNIS was so hellbent to retain ownership of the investigation into PS. They had all the paperwork from 1980 and knew all of the sordid details of what occurred on the base. They had first hand proof that PS was committing the types of crimes that I had accused him of, and it was this abuse of young children living on Canadian Forces Base Namao that started the investigation into Captain Father Angus McRae.

And from my complaints against the RCMP I now understand that the RCMP operate under the “Vampire Doctrine”.

In mythology related to Vampires, a vampire cannot cross the threshold of an entryway unless it is invited to enter.

And it appears that the RCMP, even though they are full well aware of just exactly how incompetent and compromised the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service are, cannot investigate child sexual abuse matters which occur on Canadian Forces Bases in Canada unless the incompetent and compromised military police force conducting the investigation that they’re not supposed to be conducting invites the civilian police force in.

RCMP officer awaiting invitation from CFNIS

Remember, even the MPCC in their 2020 final report noted that someone on CFB Namao made the decision back in 1980 during the investigation of Captain McRae to not call the RCMP in to deal with the babysitter.

People often wonder why I have very little faith in organizations like the Canadian Armed Forces and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The CFNIS are immune to criticism by the fact that they are isolated from the Canadian public via the military institution that they are contained within.

The CFNIS get away with what they get away with because they control the agency tasked with resolving complaints brought against them, the Military Police Complaints Commission. It is the Department of National Defence that basically set the operating parameters of the MPCC owing to the “unique circumstances” that the CFNIS operate under and how applying civilian rules may expose military operations to outside scrutiny which might jeopardize military operations.

The Canadian Forces chain of command and DND hierarchy will not hold the CFNIS accountable as they fear that this will call the entire military structure into question.

And being questioned is not something the military appreciates.

The RCMP have had scandal after scandal after scandal.

It’s like they haven’t learnt a single goddamn thing from the McDonald Report. It’s almost as if the RCMP hierarchy enjoy giving the collective Canadian public an enormous middle finger.

We had the RCMP outright lie to the Canadian Public over the unwarranted killing of Robert Dziekanski at VYR Airport which resulted in the RCMP spokesperson committing suicide for having conveyed the lies.

The RCMP tried to induce two heroin junkies into bombing the BC Legislature. I kid you not. This was a fucking farce beyond all epic proportions.

John Nuttal and Amanda Korody had become ensnared in an RCMP sting, and no one can figure out how as the RCMP haven’t exactly been truthful on this matter.

But these two were barely functional. John had plans of swimming up to an American nuclear submarine in the Georgia Straight and knocking on the hatch, and when someone opened the hatch, he was going to burst in and hijack the American nuclear submarine.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/29/canadian-couple-freed-police-entrapment-canada-day-bomb-plot

The absolutely fucking worthless CFNIS can’t investigate their way out of a wide open field on a sunny afternoon.

The RCMP don’t care about solving crimes unless they can entrap people in the crime.

Investigate child sexual abuse that the Canadian Armed Forces have kept buried for ages?

Fuck no!

Get two heroin junkies, one of who wants to swim to America and hijack an American nuclear submarine by simply knocking on the “hatch”, to “bomb” the legislature?

Sure, why the fuck not?

Lots of overtime and travel expenses to be made on this one.

And we get to be heroes!

And of course our spineless politicians in this country won’t do sweet fuck all to fix anything. They don’t want to be seen as “attacking” or “disrespecting” the protectors of our society no matter how badly these “protectors” need a swift kick in the fucking arse.

If you can’t protect children living on a secure Defence Establishment from being sexually abused by a fucking employee of the Department of National Defence, shouldn’t you at least do what you can to ensure that these sexually abused children receive justice, and if not justice, at least acknowledgement and help?

Winners and Losers

“Bobbie, it looks like you’ve done it, it looks like you’re winning!”

Nope.

The one thing that I can assure you is that there will be no winners in this matter.

Everyone associated with this matter is a loser in the sense that they’ve lost.

40 years of enduring a lifetime of self doubt and self hatred and untreated mental illnesses doesn’t suddenly disappear the instant that the Government decides to consider offering compensation to the former child victims that were denied justice and proper medical attention all those years ago.

I along with most of the other childhood victims of Captain McRae and his teenage accomplice PS lost our childhoods and our innocence on Canadian Forces Base Namao.

Some of us lost our sanity and our identities when we were dealt with by the military social workers.

Some of us lost our families when the military’s attitude towards the victims of sexual assault was unleashed within the walls of the PMQs that we lived in on base.

Some of us lost our lives through suicide. Some of us are still yet to lose our lives through Medical Assistance in Dying.

We, the numerous victims of Captain McRae and his teenage accomplice, have all collectively lost our ability to ever receive justice in this matter due to nothing more than decisions made at National Defence Head Quarters in Ottawa.

Current and former members of the Canadian Armed Forces, if they have any integrity, will have lost respect for the Canadian Armed Forces knowing that the Canadian Armed Forces actively and intentionally denied justice to victims of child sexual abuse.

Current and former members of the Canadian Armed Forces who became involved with this matter and carried out the desire by the Brass at National Defence Head Quarters to keep this matter hidden in the past have lost any claim of integrity that they once may have had.

Retired members of the Canadian Armed Forces who have enjoyed a retired life of accolades for a service well rendered have lost any respect they may have had over their involvement with the Captain Father Angus McRae child sexual abuse scandal in 1980.

Captain McRae’s accomplice, PS, has lost his designation as Captain McRae’s sole victim and has lost his ability to claim to have been an “innocent angel”.

The Canadian Forces National Investigation Service has lost any pretence of integrity that it may have had when it tried so desperately to portray the victims of Captain McRae and McRae’s teenage accomplice as”money grubbing” “societal malcontents with axes to grind against the military” contrary to the contents of documents already in the possession of the CFNIS during the time of the investigation.

The Provost Marshal lost any claim to impartiality that it had when it refused to release the 1980 CFSIU DS-120-10-80 investigation paperwork to the Military Police Complaints Commission in 2012 when I made my complaint against the CFNIS for a substandard investigation in 2011.

The Office of the Canadian Forces Ombudsman has lost any claim to relevance it had when it outright refused to conduct an inquiry into the handling of Child Sexual Abuse investigations by the Provost Marshal and the CFNIS while knowing full well that the CFNIS was found to be completely unable to conduct any manner of sexual assault investigation by two independent retired Supreme Court of Canada justices.

The Office of the Minister of National Defence has lost any claim to integrity that it may have once had when it allowed the personal opinions of the individual Ministers to cast doubt upon the veracity and integrity of the victims of military child sexual abuse.

Everybody is a loser in this matter.

Some have lost more than others.

Some will still lose even more.

Regardless, absolutely no one has won in this matter.

The Acts are stacked Against Us.

It’s hard enough in the civilian world for sexually abused children to obtain justice.

In the military world, it’s almost impossible.

In the civilian world, it’s almost impossible for a perpetrator or a perpetrator’s employer to have influence over the police, the prosecutor, or the judiciary.

In the military world, especially in the days of the pre-1998 National Defence Act, the perpetrator’s employer could have direct influence over the police, and the judiciary.

Because of the chain of command and the military hierarchy, it is completely possible for the chain of command to have undue and irresponsible influence over any investigation undertaken by the military police, the CFSIU, or the CFNIS.

This was an established fact that led to the crafting of Bill C-25 which made some very serious changes to the National Defence Act in 1998.

The National Defence Act both pre and post 1998 states that every person subject to the Code of Service Discipline shall obey the lawful commands of their superior.

So first, a superior isn’t limited to their immediate chain of command. A superior is anyone with a superior rank who has the authority to issue lawful commands

Lawful is an interesting word choice. Lawful does not equate with legal.

Lawful and legal are two completely different concepts.

Lawful just means that the superior has the authority to issue a command. Lawful does not ensure that this command is legal and that by following this lawful command the subordinate is not placing themselves in a position of violating the Criminal Code of Canada.

There have been many court martial tribunals both in Canada and in the United States in which it has been argued that it is unfair for a subordinate to be expected to disobey an illegal lawful command if the subordinate is not given access to a legal officer to review the lawful command to see if it is an illegal command.

According to the Military Police Complaints Commission in 2020, someone in 1980 made the decision to not call the RCMP in to deal with the babysitter because someone believed the babysitter to be only 12 or 13 years old in May of 1980.

The babysitter has been confirmed from various sources as having been born on June 20th, 1965. When the babysitter was interviewed in May of 1980 by the CFSIU he would have been 14 years and 10 months old.

This also proves that the CFNIS had the CFSIU investigation paperwork as early as March of 2011 as when master corporal Christian Cyr called me on May 3rd, 2011, he repeated this same “error”, that the babysitter was only 12 or 13 when he was caught buggering me.

The CFNIS in 2011 had no excuse for going with what the CFSIU investigation paperwork stated for the babysitter’s age as the CFNIS in 2011 had access to the babysitter’s Canadian Police Information Centre “CPIC” file which listed all of the dates of his charges and his convections. This CPIC file would have also clearly stated his Date of Birth D.O.B..

In 1980, the babysitter’s birthdate would have easily been obtainable from Guthrie School. Guthrie School was the school on base for children of military families and it was run by the Canadian Armed Forces as were all the other schools for children of military families on bases across Canada.

There is also another place where the babysitter’s date of birth would have been obtainable. Birth records of all military dependents are deposited into their serving parent service file.

So, someone with authority made the decision to not turn the babysitter over to the RCMP.

Why?

In the lead up to the Court Martial of Captain McRae the decision was made to move the entire court martial “In Camera”. This caused outrage in the media at the time. But I can promise you that the Canadian Armed Forces and the Department of National Defence were not going to allow the Canadian public to learn that Captain McRae and his teenage accomplice had molested 25 children, if not more, on a secure defence establishment.

The Canadian Forces couldn’t do bugger all had the babysitter gone to Juvenile Court. And yes, the media were allowed to report on juvenile cases back then with the courts usually ordering the press not to divulge the juvenile’s name or anything that could potentially identify the juvenile. The Canadian Forces would have had to throw around a lot of weight to get a civilian juvenile court judge to throw a publication ban over the trial.

Also, under the juvenile delinquents act, the adult who contributed to the delinquency of a minor could be found guilty by summary conviction in the juvenile court system. This would have meant that the Canadian Forces throwing a “veil of secrecy” over Captain McRae’s military court martial could have been all for naught as his exploits would have been made public by juvenile court.

The Somalia Report and supporting documents indicated that back in the pre-1998 days, Base Commanders could often interfere with investigations due to their rank and due to the fact that the military police were contained within the local chain of command.

My father, and just about everyone else on that base were subordinate to Colonel Munro.

Now, one thing that you’ll hear in the modern day is how when the military police or the CFNIS want to lay charges related to Criminal Code offences, they need to get the approval of a Crown Prosecutor.

This is not how it worked prior to 1998.

Prior to 1998, it was the military police or the CFSIU that laid charges.

The military police or the CFSIU were then required to present these charges to the commanding officer of the accused.

In the case of Captain Father Angus McRae the Canadian Forces have confirmed that Colonel Daniel Edward Munro, base commander of CFB Namao, was Captain McRae’s direct superior.

Colonel Munro would have then been required to conduct a summary investigation to determine if the charges brought against Captain McRae would proceed to summary trial, military tribunal, or civilian tribunal. Colonel Munro would have also had the full authority to drop these charges if he so desired. Or Colonel Munro could drop some charges while allowing other charges to proceed.

And once dropped, these charges or similar charges arising out of the same facts could never be brought against Captain McRae again at a later date.

As the Somalia Inquiry found, these commanding officers had no legal training and were not peace officers, but had the full authority under the National Defence Act to dismiss charges that they wouldn’t have even had the authority to conduct a summary trial for.

The three year time bar is another hurdle. Recently I was told by a CFNIS investigator who had investigated “the man in the sauna” that if the CFNIS ever discover the identity of the “man in the sauna” that the babysitter provided me to for the purposes of oral sex, the CFNIS will be able to prosecute this man in civilian court.

That’s not true though.

Just as the man in the sauna would have to be charged with Criminal Code offences as they were in 1980. The man from the sauna would also enjoy all of the legal protections that he had back in 1980.

Captain McRae was given a court martial for Gross Indecency, Indecent Assault, and Buggery.

These charges were reviewed by his commanding officer, Colonel Dan Munro.

Even though I would have been to young at age 8 to have been able to consent to the oral sex I performed on the man, and even though the Supreme Court of Canada, as discussed in Corporal Donal Joseph Sullivan vs. Regina, stated that the military could only conduct a court martial if the victim was over the age of 14 when consent was a possibility, the fact of the matter is the military police or the CFSIU would have had to submit the findings of their investigation to the Commanding Officer of the accused.

In 1998 when Bill C-25 removed the requirement for commanding officers to conduct summary investigations AFTER the military police or the CFSIU laid charges against the commanding officer’s subordinate, that’s all it did. Bill C-25 simply removed the requirement for a summary investigation. It did nothing to retro-actively remove this requirement.

And this poses a very significant problem. The command structure as it existed in 1980 no longer exists.

Persons who were subject to the Code of Service discipline at the time of the offence remain liable to be charged with Code of Service Discipline offences committed during their service even after they leave the military.

If the man in the sauna is discovered tomorrow, how will the military charge him? Nothing prevents the CFNIS or the base military police from conducting investigations into child sexual abuse matters. But who is going to approve charges brought against the former member?

Prior to 1998 the military police or the CFSIU didn’t take Code of Service Discipline charges to the Provincial Crowns for approval. These charges flowed to the commanding officer. After 1998 charges can go two ways. One is to the Military Prosecutor that didn’t exist prior to 1998. The other is to the Provincial Crown.

But you can’t apply this to Code of Service Discipline charges prior to 1998. Sure, you hear stories all the time of cases in civilian court where a civilian teacher, or a civilian priest from 1956 or 1966 gets sentenced to jail for sexual abuse of children. But these people are civilians. Civilians were never subject to the Code of Service Discipline, nor were their employers / supervisors required to approve charges brought against their employee.

Another issue that prevents the laying of charges for offences that occurred prior to 1998 is the 3-year-time-bar.

Even if the CFNIS do manage to figure out who the man in the sauna was that I gave a blow job to when I was 8 years old, more than three years have elapsed.

Section 59(2) of the 1970 National Defence Act states ” no person is liable to be tried by a service tribunal unless his trial begins before the expiration of a period of 3 years from the day upon which the service offence was alleged to have been convinced.

Section 120(1) of the 1970 National Defence Act enumerated ALL criminal code offences as service offences.

Section 120(2) allowed the Canadian Forces to apply minimum penalties based upon what the Criminal Code of Canada would call for.

Section 134(a) allows any military police officer to arrest anyone subject to the Code of Service Discipline WITHOUT WARRANT who is subject to the Code of Service Discipline who has committed, is found committing, is suspected of being about to commit, or is suspected of or charged with having committed a service offence.

Section 140 of the 1970 National Defence Act calls for a Commanding Officer to conduct a summary investigation AFTER the laying of charges. The Commanding officer shall either cause the charge to proceed, or shall dismiss the charges.

Section 140 would have to be undertaken before the charges could proceed to Summary Trial, Court Martial, or Civilian Tribunal.

So, here’s the problem for the modern day prosecution of child sexual abuse which occurred on Canadian Armed Forces bases prior to 1998.

The military police in 1980, had they arrested the man in the sauna would have laid charges against him.

The military police would have been required to present these charges to the commanding officer of the accused.

Now, even though the commanding officer of the accused would not have been able to conduct a summary trial for the charges related to sexual offences committed against a child under the age of consent, and even though a court martial would have been precluded for trying these charges, nothing would have stopped the commanding officer from dismissing these charges and replacing them with charges that the commanding officer or a court martial could conduct a trial for.

And I think this is what keeps the Canadian Forces from successfully prosecuting for historical child sexual abuse which occurred prior to 1998.

This would be one hell of a massive Charter Challenge by the accused.

If the accused had been arrested back in 1980 and charged with receiving oral sex from me, under the National Defence Act he had the legal right to make a plea to his commanding officer.

That avenue does not exist today.

So even though the law allows for the man in the sauna to be charged in the modern day with 1980 criminal code offences that he committed back in May to June of 1980 he wouldn’t be allowed to enjoy the legal protections that the National Defence Act would have allowed him to enjoy back in 1980.

And I can’t help but wonder if this is why you don’t hear of any modern day military or civilian tribunals for service offences which occurred prior to 1998.

I would imagine that anyone who committed a service offence prior to 1998, and is charged in the modern day with having committed that service offence prior to 1998, would simply raise the argument in court that it is unfair to try them by modern laws and practices when the laws and practices at the time of the offence would have allowed them to plead with their commanding officer for leniency or forgiveness, which the commanding officer had the full authority to offer.