Metis group hired sex offender to work with residential school survivors

OTTAWA – The Metis National Council enlisted a convicted sex offender in 2011 to work with survivors of residential schools, the church-run institutions where children endured physical, emotional and sexual abuse.

The Canadian Press obtained a copy of the council’s contract with Norman Hansen of the northern Saskatchewan village of Buffalo Narrows, as well as provincial court records showing two prior sexual assault convictions.

Hansen, now 70, declined to speak to The Canadian Press about his work for the council or his criminal record.

Reached by phone, he hung up when asked if the council knew of the convictions when it contracted him for “community liaison, information gathering and videography services.”

Court records show Hansen was convicted of two separate sexual assaults against two women in or around Saskatoon, one in February or March of 2003, the second a month later.

Hansen was sentenced to three years in a federal jail in June 2004 and prohibited from owning a variety of weapons, including crossbows and guns, for 10 years.