Ex-wife tells jury emails left her scared

VANCOUVER — A B.C. Supreme Court jury has heard tearful testimony from a woman who said a series of harassing emails from her ex-husband left her constantly looking over her shoulder.

Patrick Fox is charged with criminal harassment over alleged online communications and publications regarding his ex-wife, Desiree Capuano.

Crown prosecutor Mark Myhre said Tuesday that emails allegedly sent by Fox to Capuano asserted he would do anything to make her life miserable.

“The singular role for the rest of my life is to destroy your life,” Myhre read from one email.

Many emails Fox is alleged to have sent between 2014 and 2016 criticize Capuano’s parenting and call her an “idiot” and “moron.” The court heard those emails were also copied to their son, whose name is protected under a publication ban.

In one series of emails read out by the Crown, Fox wrote that he told their son he would shoot Capuano if shooting someone was not morally wrong and illegal.

He allegedly wrote that wanting to hurt someone wasn’t illegal and he wouldn’t actually hurt Capuano unless it was in selfdefence. “To me what that meant was … if the risk for going to jail was not there, he would shoot me, and he discussed it with our child,” Capuano testified.

Fox is also accused of possession of firearms in a place where he was not authorized to do so.

The court heard Fox allegedly created a website revealing Capuano’s personal information, including her home address, place of work and family photos, along with copies of their email correspondence.

The website allegedly referred to Capuano as a white supremacist, child abuser and drug addict.

Capuano said she was fearful of having her personal information and the identities of her son with Fox and her other son accessible to anyone.

“We talked about moving, we talked about hiding identities, about what we could do to disappear so I could protect my family,” she testified.

Capuano told the jury that her son would visit Fox in Vancouver, then return to her home to Arizona acting like a different person, appearing withdrawn and scared. “He would not associate with the family, he would not accept hugs like he normally would.”