Man gets 3.5 years for stat rape

A 39-year-old Yorkton man will serve three-and-a-half years in prison for sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl.

The man cannot be named because Judge Patrick Reis imposed a publication ban based on the defence argument that publishing the man’s identity could reasonably lead to the discovery of the victim’s identity.

According to a joint Crown-defence submission in Yorkton Provincial Court June 10, the man was involved in a relationship with the victim between October and December of 2014.

In the spring of 2015, the RCMP received a tip from someone at Yorkton Regional Health Centre that a 16-year-old had given birth to a baby whose father was a 38-year-old male. A police investigation confirmed that the mother of the child was 15 at the time of conception.

The identity of the father was never in question. After his arrest, police discovered a video on the man’s cell phone of he and the victim engaged in a sexual act. He was also charged with possession of child pornography.

The man pleaded guilty to one count of sexual assault, one count of possession of child pornography and two counts of breach of a recognizance, one for having contact with the victim while he was released on bail and one for not residing at an approved residence.

The Crown stayed nine other charges.

Prosecutor Darryl Bode advanced the joint submission recommending three-and-a-half years in prison followed by a mandatory 10-year weapons prohibition, 20 years enrollment on the national sex offender registry and no contact with the victim during his incarceration.

Also arguing for the the joint submission, Regina defence attorney Alexander Deacon cited mitigating circumstances including the fact his client has no previous criminal record, had accepted responsibility  for his actions and entered an early guilty plea.

He noted that while legally there can be no consent when a person is under the age of 16—often referred to colloquially as statutory rape—his client had not forced himself on the girl.

Deacon described his client as a dedicated father to his other three children and a good provider.

The lawyer also downplayed the breach of not living at the approved residence saying his client did the right thing by leaving the residence because he had been  requested to do so, but was wrong not to inform his bail supervisor.

Reis took those circumstances into consideration, but was not impressed with Deacon’s description of the sentence as a “long” one, suggesting it could be much longer.

In accepting the joint submission, Reis said he did so, “with some judicial restraint” characterizing the situation as “repulsive.”