A former Halifax teacher was charged Wednesday with 21 counts of gross indecency, 16 counts of sexual assault and 13 counts of indecent assault.
Michael Patrick McNutt, 66, faces charges involving 20 victims who were all youths during the 1970s and ’80s when the incidents are alleged to have occurred.
These latest charges are on top of 14 charges of gross indecency and 13 counts of indecent assault laid in January involving an additional 13 alleged victims.
“There’s no statute of limitations on sexual assaults so if anyone is a victim we would like them to come forward and there will be no judgement,” said Const. Alicia Joseph of Halifax Regional Police.
“They will be treated with compassion and dignity.”
McNutt worked as a math and science teacher for the former Halifax School Board until around 1980. He then held jobs at a series of fast food restaurants and worked as a substitute teacher at various schools around Halifax until first being charged with a sexual offence in 1994.
Police are releasing few details in relation to the alleged assaults, citing the need to protect the identity of victims.
But they are saying that in all the alleged instances McNutt was in a position of authority as either a teacher or coach of a youth sporting team and all but two incidents occurred in the Halifax area.
In 2017 three lawsuits were filed against McNutt, including two against the then Halifax regional school board (now the Halifax Regional Centre for Education). Another was filed against Hockey Canada, Hockey Nova Scotia and the Halifax Hawkes Minor Hockey Association.
The lawsuits, each with different victims, all allege that both the school board and the hockey associations knew or ought to have known about McNutt’s alleged behaviour.
One of the alleged victims said after he told a guidance counsellor and principal at Graham Creighton Junior High in Cherry Brook, they accused him of lying.
The cases were all filed under pseudonyms.
The alleged victims received responses from the court that they would have to provide their actual names on the lawsuits and no further documentation, other than responses from McNutt denying the incidents occurred, are on file.
No settlements or decisions on the lawsuits have been reached.
A court date has not yet been set for McNutt on the latest charges.
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