Brian Boucher, a Montreal reverend who was found guilty of sexually abusing two underage boys in 2019, has been officially stripped of his priesthood.
Montreal’s archdiocese announced the dismissal in a statement Friday, saying the decision was “rendered last year at the conclusion of a church judicial process” but that it was subject to appeal. No appeal was filed by Boucher, who was ordained in 1996.
“Mr. Boucher cannot exercise any form of priestly function or occupy any office reserved for clerics,” the archdiocese said in a statement.
“Moreover, he is prohibited from teaching in Catholic schools and institutions, or from exercising public functions such as lector or Eucharistic minister in a parish community.”
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Boucher was arrested in 2017. Following a trial, Boucher was convicted in January 2019 of sexually assaulting one of the victims. In the second case, he pleaded guilty to sex-related charges as a trial was set to begin just under two weeks later.
The abuse took place while he was stationed at two churches, between 1995 and 1999 in the case of one victim and between 2008 and 2011 in the other. Both victims are now adults.
Boucher was sentenced to an eight-year sentence in March 2019 for his crimes.
Montreal’s archdiocese says an independent investigation into Boucher has also wrapped up. It was led by Pepita G. Capriolo, a retired Quebec Superior Court judge who was hired in November 2019.
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Capriolo was tasked with looking at how the church handled complaints and concerns about Boucher.
The findings were presented to Archbishop Christian Lépine in September. Lépine and his team have “since been reviewing the findings and studying the recommendations.”
The full report is expected to be released publicly in November.
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— With files from the Canadian Press