Canine comfort allows girl to testify about sexual abuse by father
Damning testimony from a Calgary girl, given with the assistance of some canine comfort, has resulted in multiple convictions of her father for sexual abuse.
Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Bruce Millar on Thursday said he disbelieved the dad’s courtroom denials and accepted the evidence of the man’s young daughter.
The girl, then 7, testified more than three years ago that her biological father brutally sexually abused her between Dec. 1, 2009, and May 2, 2012, when she was between 2 1/2 and 4 1/4 years old.
She gave her evidence with the help of Calgary police trauma dog Hawk, who calmly lay by her side as she testified via closed-circuit TV from a remote witness room.
COMFORT CANINE
It was believed to be the first time in Canada a dog was used as support for a child sexual-assault complainant giving evidence.
Millar ruled a month before the girl testified that the canine could sit with her as she testified.
“You might be the first dog in Canada, Hawk, to be a court-ordered comfort dog,” Millar told the canine at the time.
The judge convicted the dad, who can’t be named to protect the victim’s identity, on eight sex-related charges, including incest and unlawful confinement, in connection with incidents in their family home.
He acquitted the 37-year-old offender of an allegation he also sexually assaulted his then-wife at knifepoint while also abusing the girl during a single incident on Dec. 24, 2011.
Millar agreed with defence lawyer Alain Hepner there were inconsistencies between three videotaped statements the girl gave to police and her evidence in court, but said they were inconsequential.
“Many of these are insignificant,” he said.
“When describing what happened to her and who did it, (she) was positive and clear it was her father.”
Millar also accepted Crown prosecutor Rosalind Greenwood’s assertion the father’s testimony should not be believed.
“(His) demeanour on the (witness) stand came across as artificial and he was engaging in what I call virtue-seeking answers,” the judge said.
“Some of the claims in his testimony were either improbable or absurd.”
A doctor testified the child had injuries to her privates consistent with prior sexual assault, and Millar rejected suggestions that they may have been as a result of abuse at the hands of her maternal grandfather.
Although the Saskatchewan man was convicted of sexually abusing one of his own daughters, there was no reliable evidence the grandfather abused the child, Millar said.
The offender, who had been on bail, was taken into custody and his sentencing hearing will be set next month.