TYB
17 Canadians among new accusers in Peter Nygard rape lawsuit
Seventeen Canadian women have come forward accusing fashion mogul Peter Nygard of rape and sexual assault, adding their allegations to an international rape lawsuit involving 46 women in total. Three of the Canadian women say they were 16 years old or younger when the alleged assaults took place. One says she was 14. Nine of the assaults are alleged to have taken place in Canada. The allegations are contained in an updated class-action legal complaint filed in New York on Monday by civil lawyers acting for a group of women who say they were raped by Nygard. The complaint also names several Canadian Nygard executives, claiming they "conspired," "concealed" and "enabled" their boss's alleged criminal behaviour. None of the allegations have been proven in court.
The original lawsuit involves 10 complainants who allege Nygard raped them. All but one of them were from the Bahamas, where Nygard owns a palatial seaside mansion. The new lawsuit involves women who came forward after the original claim, alleging rapes in different locales around the world, including Winnipeg, Montreal and Toronto. "Canada is a huge factor in our lawsuit now," said Lisa Haba, one of the lawyers acting for the complainants. "More than a third of our victims are from Canada."
The Canadian allegations include a woman, referred to as Jane Doe No. 15, who says she was flown to Winnipeg for a modelling job. The complaint says she was held "captive" for three days by Nygard and repeatedly raped. "After three days, Jane Doe No. 15 was able to escape," the complaint says. "She was told by Nygard's nephew not to report Nygard's crimes to the Winnipeg police because Nygard 'owns them.'" Another says she attended a party at Nygard's office in Toronto when she was 16 years old. She claims Nygard drugged and raped her.
A third says she was 15 when Nygard pushed her into a bathroom at a Winnipeg restaurant and raped her. She says Nygard knew her father, who was in the fur business at the time. Another, referred to as Jane Doe No. 18, met Nygard at the airport in Montreal. The claim says she was offered a ride to her "dormitory." On the way she says Nygard stopped to drop his bags off at his apartment.
"Nygard invited Jane Doe No. 18 up to his apartment to wait for him," the complaint says. "While at the apartment, Nygard forcibly raped Jane Doe No. 18." She was 19 years old at the time. The youngest complainant says she was just 14 when she met Nygard in Winnipeg, where she grew up.
"Nygard picked Jane Doe No. 44 up on the street where young, adolescents gathered on several occasions," the complaint says. "Nygard promised Jane Doe No. 44 that he would fly her to California, where he could take her to parties with drugs and alcohol. Nygard drove Jane Doe No. 44 to the Nygard Companies property in Winnipeg on several occasions and paid her for oral sex. Nygard would then drive Jane Doe No. 44 back to where he picked her up."
The complaint says several of Nygard's senior employees were aware of and helped cover up his alleged crimes in order to profit from his brand and company. "Until recently, Nygard has largely been able to silence his victims, with the help of the Nygard Companies and their upper-level executives and employees, through various tactics including intimidation, threats of retribution, bribery, payoffs and forced non-disclosure agreements," the complaint says. "We have corroborating evidence that each one of [the named senior employees] definitely knew what was going on and in some capacity enabled him to continue," said Haba.
In February, the FBI raided Nygard's offices in New York and California. Following that, Nygard said he would step down as chairman of his company and divest his ownership stake. In March, a Manitoba judge ordered the company into receivership. The Nygard chain, headquartered in Winnipeg, operated 169 retail stores in North America and had 1,450 employees worldwide. Nygard, through his spokespeople, has repeatedly blamed the allegations on an ongoing feud with his neighbour in the Bahamas, retired billionaire hedge fund manager Louis Bacon. "These claims … are the product of a well-funded and well-documented scheme by Louis Bacon to pay women to fabricate stories about him," Nygard spokesperson Frydman said in his statement. "Peter Nygard looks forward to exposing the details of the billionaire-backed conspiracy Louis Bacon has orchestrated for years, which sadly now counts as its victims the more than 1,400 people who worked for the Nygard companies and relied upon those jobs to support themselves and their families."
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/peter-nygard-canadian-accusers-1.5540392
Christians in China Arrested for Participating in a Zoom Worship Service
China’s crackdown on anyone practising Christianity does not seem to be limited to how one worships God but the fact that they worship God in itself is criminal in China.
During this pandemic, Christians in China, restricted by government regulations on social distancing and the obvious ban on gatherings, chose what has come to be a popular app for video calls and conferencing – Zoom.
Zoom is an online video conferencing app that helps connect people through video calls and chats and has immense conferencing capabilities allowing multiple people to be on the same video call.
Now members of the Early Rain Covenant church in China got arrested because they were held Easter church service using Zoom. They were afterwards warned against taking part in religious activities of any kind. Several members of the church would later be arrested thanks to China’s immense surveillance program.
International Christian Concern(ICC), a group that monitors and reports all persecuted Christians worldwide, reported that the Chinese Christians were participating in an Easter worship on Sunday using Zoom from their homes when six leaders of the church got arrested by the Public Security Bureau.
The 5,000-member Sichuan house church, led by pastor Wang Yi, has not been able to gather in person since the government shut down the church in 2018 and arrested their pastor and other leaders. Since then, there services have been held online.
A member of Early Rain Church told ICC, “At that time I was also in the Zoom call, but there was a long period of time where I did not hear a thing. I thought it’s the network connection issue at first, but I soon heard a quarrel erupt. Our co-worker Wang Jun was questioning some people, [saying], ‘Who are you to do this [to us]?’”
https://adventinformer.org/en/news/end-times-news/christians-in-china-arrested-for-participating-in-a-zoom-worship-service/