Former youth worker in court for alleged sexual relationship with 14-year-old boy in care

A former youth worker with Alberta Child and Family Services is on trial in Calgary. She is accused of having a long-term sexual relationship with a boy she met when he was 14 and of living in a closed residential facility for youth with behavioural problems.

Beverly Allard, 65, is accused of sexual exploitation. Her trial began on Monday before Judge Lisa Silver at the Court of King’s Bench.

This charge is different from sexual assault and alleges that Allard was in a position of trust or authority over the plaintiff.

In 1990, Allard was 31 years old when she met the boy, whose mother had left the boy’s care with Alberta Child and Family Services (CFS).

Allard was assigned as the teenager’s social worker at William Roper Hull, a residential care facility in Calgary.

Allard joined the police 24 years ago

The plaintiff’s identity is protected by a publication ban. He is scheduled to testify on Tuesday.

According to prosecutor Donna Spaner, Allard admitted to the sexual relationship in a lengthy statement to police in 1998, but “the file remained dormant” for 24 years before charges were filed in May 2022.

CBC News asked Calgary police why more than two decades passed before charges were filed, but the CPS said in an email that it could not comment or provide any information because the case was before the courts.

According to prosecutor Donna Spaner, the two began having sex in 1990.

It is not yet clear what Dale Knisely, Allard’s attorney, will say in her defense.

The relationship remained

The trial began on Monday with the Crown’s first witness, Judith Weston, who served as a supervisor at the CFS in the 1990s.

In the summer of 1991, “CFS staff became aware of the close relationship between Allard and (the teenager),” Spaner said in her opening statement. “Although they were aware of the concerns, the relationship between them continued.”

In 1998, Allard and her lawyer, the same one who had represented her in court, went to the police in Edmonton – where she was living at the time – to “tell her story.”

“Allard no longer wanted a relationship with (the plaintiff) at that time,” Spaner said.

Allard told a detective in the Edmonton Police Department’s Sex Crimes Unit about the accused’s “year-long sexual relationship with (the alleged victim) when he was a child in care,” as Spaner described it.

According to prosecutors, the detective then handed the file over to Calgary police.

Spaner told the judge that the plaintiff would testify about his “life struggles” – the 47-year-old is currently in prison and has been in custody for years.