A Quebec Superior Court judge has authorized a class-action suit that will be brought against billionaire Robert Miller by women who have alleged he paid to have sex with them for money when they were minors.
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Justice Catherine Piché delivered a 76-page decision on Monday on the request made by lawyers Jeff Orenstein and Lawrence David. The lawyers represent women who allege Miller and people who worked for him organized a system where teenage girls were recruited and showered with gifts and cash before Miller had sex with them in downtown Montreal hotels and later at a residence in Westmount.
The request for the class action lawsuit, which means many plaintiffs can file claims, was made after Radio-Canada’s program Enquête aired a documentary in which several women were interviewed. Miller has since been charged in criminal court with several alleged sex-related offences. Lawyers who have represented the 81-year-old in court have said he is bedridden and is too ill to appear in court
Miller sold Future Electronics Inc. after the documentary aired, but the company and three other men are also named in the class action lawsuit. The other men are Helmut Lippman, Raymond Poulet and Sam Joseph Abrams. They are former employees of the company based in Pointe-Claire.
The defendants tried to block the authorization of the lawsuit by arguing the potential plaintiffs should not have been allowed to file anonymous statements that were not signed. Piché rejected that argument in her decision.
The judge also authorized the following group to be representatives “for the purpose of exercising the collective action” against Miller and the others: “All persons who, while less than 18 years old, provided sexual services in exchange for remuneration, and/or were victims of sexual exploitation, and/or have been victims of incitement to sexual contact from Robert G. Miller, Raymond Poulet, Sam Joseph Abrams, Helmut Lippmann and/or Future Electronics Inc.”
In her conclusion, Piché also wrote that several “principal questions of fact and law” will be addressed in the lawsuit. Included among the questions is whether Miller obtained the sexual services of minors, did he exploit minors and “did the defendants Sam Joseph Abrams and/or Raymond Poulet and/or Helmut Lippmann encourage or aid as accomplices in the performance of these wrongful conducts?”
Another question will be: “Did one or more of the defendants wrongfully participate in an organized juvenile prostitution scheme?”