A Surrey woman is suing a Parksville church and a former youth group leader, who she alleges had a sexual relationship with her as a 15-year-old in the 1980s.
Brenda Tombs joined a youth group at the Parksville Fellowship Baptist Church in 1985, where she met Charles Aiken, the group’s 26-year-old leader, says a notice of civil claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court on Friday.
Aiken, who played guitar and “made Christianity seem cool” was popular with the teens, Tombs said in a personal statement shared by her lawyer.
“As a young person who wasn’t terribly popular in school at that age, I felt like I finally fit in somewhere. And at the helm of it all was [Aiken] — charming, funny and in charge of our exciting social lives,” Tombs said.
As a 15-year-old in his group, Tombs felt singled out by Aiken, who acted as a counsellor to the youths, helping them with their teenage problems, she said.
Tombs alleges Aiken told her he wanted to have a secret relationship with her.
“He was handsome and loved by us all and since I was under his spell, I acquiesced,” she said in her statement.
She alleges the two carried on a relationship for months, hiding it from everyone they knew until it was discovered in 1986.
The allegations have not been tested in court. No response to the claim by Aiken or the church had been filed by Monday afternoon.
Aiken left town with his family after their relationship was discovered, and Tombs said she felt abandoned by him, by the church and by the youth group members, who shunned her.
“I felt isolated, ashamed and alone,” she said.
In the decades since, she carried self-loathing and shame, struggling with her mental health and getting into abusive relationships and drugs. It wasn’t until she saw a therapist that she realized the relationship with Aiken had not been her fault, she said.
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Tombs said she has worked through her trauma and is choosing to speak out to prevent the exploitation of others.
“It has recently occurred to me, however, that it’s possible there could be another 15-year-old girl in the same kind of trouble right now. That is the reason why I’ve decided to proceed with this action,” she said.
Tombs is suing both Aiken and the church, alleging it was complicit in a culture that enabled sexual predators.
Someone who answered the phone at the Parksville Fellowship Baptist Church on Monday said they have no comment.
Mallory Hogan, a lawyer with KazLaw Injury and Trauma Lawyers who is representing Tombs, said trying a sexual abuse case in civil court is a way to give survivors a voice, as it can be difficult to access justice through the criminal court system for sexual abuse survivors.
The cases Hogan handles often involve institutions, such as boy scouts, cadets, schools and churches, she said, and lodging a civil claim against the institution is an opportunity to hold it accountable that doesn’t exist in the criminal system.
“You can’t lay a charge against an institution for rape. It’s just the perpetrator,” Hogan said. In a civil claim, a lawyer can argue that an institution ought to have known what was happening and had an opportunity to stop abuse, she said.
“I think the only way that we’re ever going to get policy and institutional change is through these kinds of civil cases against various entities such as churches, or boy scouts, or schools. That’s how you get change. That’s how you ensure that children are kept safe when they are within the institution,” Hogan said.
It’s common for survivors to wait many years or decades before choosing to come forward and launch a civil suit, because it can take that long for survivors to come to terms with what happened to them, she said.
Tombs is at a point in life where she has the strength now to talk about her situation, she said.
“If you take this client, for example, her M.O., her reason for bringing this action is because she doesn’t want this to happen to any other 15-year-old girl. When she was 15, she didn’t have the ability to speak out.”
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