OPP charges eastern Ontario teacher with decades-long accusations of sexual assault against minors

The founder of the FACE school in Montreal is being accused of sexually assaulting young male students during extracurricular trips to his farm in Cornwall, Ont. and visits at his home during the 70s and 80s. (CTV News)

The Ontario Provincial Police have arrested a teacher with sexual offences on minors spanning decades while he was living near Cornwall, Ont.

Phillip Baugniet, 80, now a resident of Victoria, British Columbia, was arrested on Oct. 11 by OPP at the Victoria Police Department and charged with multiple offences, including one count of sexual assault on a person under the age of 16.

Police say the incidents are said to have occurred throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s while the accused was a teacher at the Fine Arts Core Education (FACE) school in Montreal and was living in the South Stormont Township, Ont.

Students from the school travelled to a location in the township on multiple occasions during that timeframe.

Baugniet was charged with the following offenses:

· Indecent Assault on Male - seven counts

· Buggery

· Sexual Assault on a Person Under 16 years of age

· Sexual Assault - two counts

· Sexual Interference- three counts

A separate class-action lawsuit against the man was filed in February, where he was accused of sexually assaulting multiple young students, some as young as seven, during extracurricular activities at his farm.

The lawsuit alleged that he used his position of authority to gain the trust of young male students in order to abuse them while he was the principal at the former Victoria School in Montreal, and then later at the FACE school, which he founded in 1975.

None of the allegations in the class-action lawsuit have been tested in court.

The accused in the OPP police investigation was released from custody following a bail hearing and is scheduled to appear before the Ontario Court of Justice in Cornwall on Nov. 16.

With files from CTV News Montreal’s Joe Lafaro.