Intimate video livestreamed, court hears
Woman testifies that man accused of sex assault shared video of her naked, vomiting Patrick Walsh, 22, is charged with sexual assault and publishing an intimate image without consent.
The Crown has opened its case against a Toronto man accused of sexually assaulting a Ryerson University student and livestreaming video of her, naked and throwing up, to his laughing friends.
Patrick Walsh, 22, pleaded not guilty to sexual assault and publishing an intimate image without consent.
The woman, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, testified Thurs- day that Walsh approached her at Grace O’Malley’s pub on Duncan St. on May12, 2016, and told her they had met once at a party sometime within the previous year.
She was feeling intoxicated after drinking several shots of vodka and accepted his invitation to step outside, where they kissed.
The tall, skinny, fair-haired man then asked if she wanted to go to his mother’s nearby apartment in the Entertainment District. The woman said she assumed his friends would be gathered there, but when they arrived, “I realized no one was there and everything escalated very fast,” she told a Superior Court jury.
At first, the petite woman, who was 19 at the time, said she consented.
“I was OK with kissing for sure, (and) assisted in taking off my top,” she said.
But she started to feel “uncomfortable” after he put his hand on her head and “forced me to give oral sex. That’s when I was not OK. …. (I was) kind of freaking out,” she said fighting to maintain her composure in court.
She recalled “freezing up” and said she felt “almost like a statue,” but didn’t vocalize her concern at that point.
After he “allowed” her to raise her head, the woman said she went into “panic mode. That’s when he got on top of me. That’s when penetration started happening. I said no … four or five times.”
He continued to have intercourse and told her it was “fine,” the woman said.
Her “survival mode” kicked in when she started to sober up and thought “this is sexual assault and not OK.”
She testified she suffers from “very, very severe anxiety” — she is on antidepressants — and told him she was going to throw up.
He was “repulsed” and told her “ooh, get out,” she testified.
The woman says she went into the bathroom and while she was naked and vomiting, she heard laughing and saw the accused pointing his cellphone “away from his face.”
She also recognized the telltale “chiming” sound that he was using the iPhone’s FaceTime app.
“I clued into the fact he was FaceTiming somebody, like me, naked and throwing up,” she said under questioning by Crown attorney Brigid McCallum.
She couldn’t make out what the voices were saying, but “I just remembered (them) making fun of me.”
“Anyone could see that,” or it could end up as someone’s “screenshot” on their cell or computer, she remembered thinking.
The woman said she buried her face in her arms on the toilet while she continued to vomit.
She said she was “so embarrassed” and “did not want that to get out.”
A short time later, Walsh’s male friends started arriving at the apartment where she remained ashamed and unable to get to her feet. She repeatedly asked someone to call an ambulance, “but no one was listening.”
“They didn’t have much regard for me as a person,” she said.
Eventually, one of the young men gave her his shirt and accompanied her home in a cab.
The next day, the woman returned to the pub and retraced her steps to the apartment in order to retrieve her cellphone. After visiting at least 20 buildings, she recognized the lobby and called police.
McCallum told the jury they will hear evidence collected from Walsh’s cellphone.
Under the Criminal Code, a person who distributes or transmits intimate images of someone who didn’t give their consent could face a sentence of up to five years in prison.
An intimate image means a visual image of a person “in which the person is nude … is exposing his or her genital organs or anal region or her breasts or is engaged in explicit sexual activity,” the Criminal Code says.
The trial continues today in front of Ontario Superior Court Justice Kelly Byrne.