Crown given month to decide how to prosecute serial rapist

Alberta Justice must tell judge whether it is seeking dangerous offender status

Alberta Justice has a month to decide whether it will seek dangerous offender status for a serial rapist who pleaded guilty last year to a two-decade-old sexual assault.

Provincial court Judge John Bascom imposed that deadline on the justice minister Monday at the conclusion of a bail review for Charlie Henry Desjarlais.

Bascom accepted an application by Crown prosecutor Pam McCluskey to revoke Desjarlais’ bail pending sentencing on a charge of sexual assault with a weapon.

At defence counsel Mitch Stephensen’s request, Bascom imposed a publication ban on submissions in the bail revocation application.

Desjarlais, 55, pleaded guilty last November to attacking a woman before dawn on Aug. 14, 1997, in a downtown alley as she was walking to a nearby LRT station.

He was charged in June after confessing to Innisfail RCMP about the crime while he was serving a sentence for another sexual assault.

At the time, McCluskey did not seek Desjarlais’ detention without bail because it would have meant his removal from Bowden Institution where he had access to sex offender treatment.

But his statutory release date on that sentence is next month, meaning he could go free if his bail wasn’t revoked on the current charge.

In January, co-prosecutor Karuna Ramakrishnan asked for a psychiatric assessment to determine if the Crown would be proceeding with an application to have Desjarlais declared a dangerous offender, which could result in an indeterminate

prison term.

But Bascom noted he had not yet been told whether the justice minister has approved such an application.

“I see no reason why the Attorney General hasn’t decided yet,” Bascom said, following his decision to order Desjarlais detained pending a sentence hearing in February.

“I’m going to give the province one month to make that determination whether the Crown is going to proceed on a dangerous offender application.”

Bascom said that would not have to be formally done on the court record and the prosecution can provide him with a letter indicating its intention.

In the 1997 attack, Desjarlais grabbed his 19-year-old victim as she walked by an alley around 5:15 a.m., forced her to remove her clothing and raped her.

He said he would “cap” her if she fled, leading the victim to believe

he had a gun.

His criminal record includes two other “stranger rapes” from 1994 and 1995 for which he was sentenced in 2003 and 2016 respectively, a 1982 conviction for the

I see no reason why the Attorney General hasn’t decided yet.

then-offence of rape and a 2002 conviction for sexual interference of a minor.

He’s set to face a two-week sentencing hearing beginning Feb. 11.