Nurse loses licence over sex assault convictions

Man pleaded guilty to abusing children

Saskatchewan’s regulator for registered nurses has expelled a member convicted of sex crimes against children, and will bill the now former member for the costs of investigating his actions and holding a disciplinary hearing.

The offender, who cannot be named due to a court-ordered publication ban meant to protect the identities of his victims, was arrested in May 2018. He pleaded guilty in June 2018 to sexual assault, sexual interference and invitation to sexual touching, all in relation to two victims under the age of 16, according to a disciplinary decision released by the Saskatchewan Registered Nurses Association (SRNA) earlier this month.

He was sentenced to six years in prison following a sentencing hearing in September 2018. The Starphoenix reported from a sentencing hearing at that time presided over by Saskatoon Provincial Court Judge Doug Agnew for a then 44-year-old nurse who was found to have abused his adopted daughters repeatedly between Jan. 1, 2017 and May 11, 2018, starting when the youngest was approximately four months old.

SRNA’S disciplinary procedures began with a letter from the nurse’s former employers received in June 2018, indicating they’d fired the man after learning he’d been arrested and held in custody since mid-may of that year. From there, the regulator informed the man he was to be the subject of a disciplinary hearing for professional misconduct.

The man admitted to the offences and waived his right to attend the disciplinary hearing or to have a lawyer present, writing that he didn’t want to waste the committee’s time and that he understood his licence to practice as a nurse would be revoked.

SRNA executive director Cindy Smith explained that under provincial law, the association still must conduct its own investigative and disciplinary processes, apart from any court proceedings, when a member is charged with a crime.

She said the process also lets the association show publicly that there are clear expectations regarding how nurses conduct themselves, given the public trust necessary for the profession.

“It’s really about accountability and transparency,” she said. “We need to show that those decisions are being made and we need to make sure those decisions are being disclosed.”

Along with the expulsion, the SRNA disciplinary committee ordered the expelled member to pay for the costs of his hearing and the investigative process. That total was listed at $26,500. The committee lowered the charge to $25,000, payable within five years of his release from prison, in consideration of the man’s guilty plea and a letter he wrote outlining the potential financial hardship to his family.

Smith said even though the former member admitted to professional misconduct, the SRNA still had to account for lawyer’s fees and the various other costs associated with the process. She said the avenues available to recoup those costs are either to charge them to the offender, or effectively force the province’s registered nurses to cover them.

“Our revenues come from our members, so all the registered nurses and nurse practitioners in the province pay fees. So, indirectly, it’s our members who would be paying for this.”

Smith noted that cases of any of the SRNA’S approximately 12,000 members being subject to disciplinary hearings are rare, and cases of members being expelled even more rare.

Three of the eight disciplinary decisions published on the association’s website since December 2016 have resulted in a member being expelled.