Ex-Alberta teacher who sexually abused student charged with assaulting former partner in Ontario

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A one-time globe-trotting educational administrator on parole for sex crimes against a student in Alberta is facing a new charge in Ontario.

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Paul Sheppard, 61, was charged Nov. 14 with a single count of assault with a weapon, Niagara Regional Police said in a statement. He is accused of assaulting a man in St. Catharines in 2017. Sheppard denies the allegation.

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Christopher Proudfoot, the complainant in the case, claims Sheppard struck him without his consent while he was in a relationship with Sheppard and his partner, Liam Coward, a well-known LGBTQ advocate and Ontario NDP employee who died of an overdose in 2022 at age 28.

Proudfoot, 32, said he met Sheppard and Coward through a dating app in early 2017. He said he initially agreed to engage in BDSM practices with the two, including “light” spankings with belts, flogging implements, and a bamboo cane.

Proudfoot said the violence of the spankings intensified over the weeks, and he grew to fear Sheppard. Things came to a head in late May 2017, Proudfoot said, when Sheppard allegedly struck him hard without his consent. Proudfoot says he responded by smacking Sheppard, after which Sheppard allegedly assaulted him.

“It was way too much, and Liam pulled him off of me, and then that’s the last time I was with them in person,” Proudfoot said.

“This was not merely spanking,” he added. “It was assault with a weapon that left cuts and even drew small amounts of blood.”

Proudfoot has a rare spinal cord disorder and claims he developed health problems during and after his contact with Sheppard. He said he only learned of Sheppard’s past after Coward died, which led him to news articles about Sheppard’s court cases.

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Former Alberta boys’ school headmaster

At the time of his arrest earlier this month, Sheppard was on parole for sexually abusing a student at the now-defunct Saint John’s School of Alberta, an Edmonton-area boys’ school where Sheppard taught in the early 1990s and later returned as headmaster. He was convicted of two sex abuse counts in 2021 after a jury heard he forced Stacey Easton, then a Grade 7 student, to perform sex acts under the guise of administering spankings, part of the school’s corporal punishment regime.

Sheppard was sentenced to six years in prison, though the sentence was later reduced on appeal to just under four years.

An international career educator with a doctorate in education management, Sheppard previously faced scandal in England related to his time at Ampleforth Academy, where he briefly taught in 1989. Students came forward years later claiming Sheppard had abused them, though he was ultimately acquitted.

In both cases, Alberta judge Allan Fradsham spoke on Sheppard’s behalf.

Sheppard was granted parole on the Saint John’s charges in July despite insisting there was no sexual motive to the crimes. It emerged during the parole hearing that Sheppard had previously been a police officer in Stratford, Ont., and that he had pleaded guilty to assault for administering bare-bottom spankings to five boys he met through policing.

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Sheppard resigned from the force in 1986, shortly after the charges were laid. Five counts of sexual assault were withdrawn following his guilty plea.

Sheppard was arrested on the latest charge at Niagara Regional Police Service headquarters in Niagara Falls. He was released on an undertaking and is set to appear in court on Dec. 17 in St. Catharines.

A Correctional Service Canada spokesperson said the service is aware of Sheppard’s new charges, and it remains to be determined whether they will impact his parole.

In an email, Sheppard’s defence lawyer, Brian Beresh, said his client denies the St. Catharines allegations.

“We believe that this is a false allegation, and Mr. Sheppard looks forward to defending it to the fullest extent allowed by law in his search for justice.”

Sheppard is also facing a 2023 lawsuit from Ontario man Cory Bernier, claiming Sheppard sexually abused him in 1985, when Bernier was a nine-year-old assigned to Sheppard through Big Brothers Big Sisters. Sheppard also denies that allegation, which has not been proven in court.

[email protected]

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