New sex crimes trial for OHL billet, teacher
A new trial has been ordered for a former Ontario Hockey League billet and Kingston school teacher accused of sex crimes against children.
Neil Joynt, 77, was convicted in Napanee in October 2016 of two counts of indecent assault and sentenced to eight months in jail.
The offences allegedly occurred in the 1960s and ’70s at the home of Joynt’s parents at Battersea and on a camping trip near Big Rideau Lake, involving two boys who were not hockey players.
Justices Mary Lou Benotto, Janet Simmons, Russell Juriansz of the Court of Appeal for Ontario cited two reasons in their decision to overturn Joynt’s conviction.
First was because during Crown attorney Robert Corbella’s closing address to the jury he presented to the jury statements from one of the victims, W.H., which should have been found inadmissible.
The justices wrote that Justice Robert Scott didn’t correct Corbella’s submission or give the jury of seven men and five women any instructions on the limited use of the statements.
“In these circumstances, the failure to deliver instructions on the permissible and impermissible use of prior consistent statements is an error in law,” the appeal judgment read.
“Moreover, because the jury was permitted to use the evidence concerning the complainant, W.H., as similar-fact evidence in relation to the complainant, T.E., this error taints the conviction in relation to T.E. as well.”
Benotto, Simmons and Juriansz said that Scott also failed to give the jury “any review whatsoever of the evidence led at trial.”
“The appeal is allowed, the convictions are set aside, and a new trial is ordered,” the decision read.
One of the victims in the case reached out to the Kingston Whig-Standard on Friday to say he was obviously very disappointed with the decision.
The trial was held over two weeks in Napanee, and Joynt’s family supported him throughout the proceedings. His wife, Margaret, son Richard, and one of Richard’s childhood friends all testified in Joynt’s defence. The Crown called five witnesses during the trial.
Joynt taught at now-closed Calvin Park Public School in Kingston and was the longest serving billet in OHL history, having boarded players for 33 years.
A date for Joynt’s new trial has not yet been set.