John Furlong: Northern British Columbia

Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics Dept: VANCOUVER - John Furlong, whose reputation as the face of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics was tarnished earlier this year by decades-old allegations of abuse at a school in northern British Columbia, has filed a lawsuit targeting the weekly newspaper that first published the claims, a spokeswoman says, according to Winnipeg Free Press. The free, weekly newspaper published a story on Sept. 27 that quoted eight former students who claimed Furlong hit, kicked and verbally abused them and other students during his time as a physical education teacher in the late 1960s and early 1970s and former Vancouver Olympic organizing committee president and CEO John Furlong, in Vancouver, B.C., on September 27, 2012. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck Furlong's lawyers filed a statement of claim Tuesday targeting the owner of the Georgia Straight newspaper, reporter Laura Robinson, publisher Daniel McLeod and editor Charlie Smith, according to an emailed statement from Furlong spokeswoman Catherine Locke. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.