A trusted friend and an ‘extremely vulnerable’ teen

WATERLOO REGION — She was 17 when a trusted family friend, 27, sent her a picture of a penis and later asked her to send him topless photos. She refused.

After he was charged with sex crimes, many people took his side, spreading innuendo while she struggled with drugs, depression, anxiety and the fallout from an attempted suicide.

“Some people believe I’m a whore, a slut,” the girl said in court.

She wept, telling the court how the backlash hurt her and her family. “I never asked for this at all,” she said. “He destroyed any faith I had in trusting others.”

But she also found support in court, and it made her feel better.

Justice Elliott Allen was angered Friday to hear of the backlash against the girl and her family. He tailored his conviction of her tormentor to make this clear.

“I feel relief,” the girl, now 18, said outside court. “The anxiety is lower than it was.”

Spencer Lewis, now 29, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of criminal harassment. The Barrie man will spend 30 days in jail on weekends so he can keep his job with Desjardins Insurance. He has no prior convictions.

Prosecutors withdrew sex-related charges in exchange for the guilty plea. His victim wants to be named but a court banned publication of her identity.

“This was a sex offence,” Allen said. He called it a selfish act committed by a man preying on an “extremely vulnerable teenage girl.”

Court heard that Lewis befriended the local girl, her parents and her brother through their shared love of stock car racing. Lewis was an announcer at Sunset Speedway near Barrie, and also a racing promoter. The girl’s brother is an avid stock car driver.

Lewis helped her brother with his racing and became close to the family. The girl met Lewis when she was 16. They texted each other. Sometimes she would help him, sending pictures of race cars. The family trusted him.

In November 2015 he sent her a picture of a penis. She told her parents. They shrugged it off as a joke. Last March he sent another text. “You’re awesome. All that’s missing is a topless photo and I think we’re good.” Later he texted, “No topless photo?” Sad emoji. The family went to police. Lewis was arrested while at work last April, charged with making sexually explicit material available to a child, and luring a person under 18.

In victim impact statements, the girl and her parents said many in the stock car racing community turned against them.

After Lewis was charged, he said bad things about her brother to damage his racing career. The victim’s mother was stunned to read some of the texts Lewis sent to others about her son.

Last August, Lewis showed up at the Sunset Speedway while the girl was there with her family. He was on bail, ordered to stay away from her. She broke down, afraid of running into him.

The girl’s mother demanded that the race track bar Lewis, citing the charges against him and his bail conditions.

Track owner Brian Todish temporarily banned the mother instead.

“It would appear that the people at the race track have decided to take his side,” Allen said, baffled by a letter of support the Speedway owner also wrote for Lewis.

Court heard that the girl’s family is looking for a different place to race. They don’t know the impact on her brother’s racing career. The family have been racing stock cars for 50 years.

“Racing isn’t the same any more because of him,” the girl said, weeping. “He ruined it for my family.”

Allen was dismayed to learn that a recommended probation would not bar Lewis from the Sunset Speedway.

He ordered Lewis to stay away for two years from any race track where the girl’s brother is registered, or any track where her brother has recently been registered.

Fixing his gaze on Lewis, the judge said, “You’re not chasing them out of their hobby.”

Lewis, a bearded man in glasses and a leather jacket, did not address the court before he was led away, convicted.

He’ll start his jail sentence Feb. 25.