After the sovereign pontiff, the turn of the Canadian cardinal Marc Ouellet to speak on the accusations of sexual assault. Actions he would have committed in Canada, when he was the Archbishop of Quebec. “Having learned of the false accusations made against me by the complainant (F.), I firmly deny having made inappropriate gestures on her person,” Bishop Ouellet said in a statement published on the Vatican news site. He also said he was ready to participate in a trial to prove “his innocence”.
According to the complainant, an intern at the time of the events and designated only by the letter F, he would have carried out inappropriate touching between 2008 and 2010 at the Archdiocese of Quebec. Charges appearing in a document made public on August 16 and resulting from the collective action authorized by the Superior Court of this French-speaking province in May.
“I consider the interpretation and dissemination of these allegations as sexual assault to be defamatory. If a civil investigation should be opened, I will actively participate in it so that the truth is established and my innocence is recognized,” the cardinal concluded in this statement published in French and Italian.
Marc Ouellet, 78, is the current prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, one of the most important functions of the Vatican government.
No new investigation against the cardinal
Pope Francis had for his part from Thursday excluded for lack of “sufficient elements”, the opening of a new investigation against the cardinal. In 2021, the pope responded to a letter from F. by appointing “Father Jacques Servais to investigate Cardinal Marc Ouellet”. And it is precisely on the basis of the elements gathered by Father Servais that the Pope decided to exclude an investigation against Bishop Ouellet, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni explained on Thursday.
The spokesman specifies that Father Servais, whose preliminary investigation concluded on the absence of sufficient elements, was again contacted by the pope, who received the assurance that there was no reason to continue the procedure.
Unusually, Matteo Bruni’s press release, written in Italian, quotes Father Servais’ statements in French: “There is no reason to open an investigation for the sexual assault of person F by Card. Mr. Ouellet,” he says. “Neither in the report written and sent to the Holy Father, nor in the testimony via Zoom that I subsequently collected in the presence of a member of the ad hoc diocesan committee, did this person make an accusation that would provide material to such an investigation,” said Father Servais.