Convicted sex-offender fined for drunk driving
Venn was Alberta’s first to wear GPS device
A violent sex offender living in Calgary has pleaded guilty to impaired driving three years after police were forced to stop monitoring his whereabouts.
Gregory Venn, whose criminal history dates back three decades, was the first high-risk criminal in Alberta — and only the second in Canada — to be fitted with a GPS ankle device after serving his latest full sentence in 2008.
But because Venn’s sentence is complete, the courts no longer re- quired police to monitor Venn for risky behaviour.
Alberta Justice officials say they will not be taking any additional steps other than the impaireddriving sentence imposed by the court Thursday.
Venn, 50, pleaded guilty to an impaired-driving charge from June 6. Police stopped Venn behind the wheel in the Dover area of 47th Street of 23rd Ave. S.E.
He was fined $1,100 and is banned from driving for a year. Venn, who lives in the Greenview area of the city’s northeast, has also lost his job with a road construction company, court heard.
Back in 2009, police were so worried Venn would commit another violent act, they obtained permission to monitor him with a special bracelet and GPS device.
But a Calgary provincial court ruled in 2010 that Venn’s restrictions would be eased after he avoided trouble for a year and a half after his 2008 release.
Twice in the 1980s, he was convicted of breaking into homes and sexually assaulting a woman inside.
Police put him under surveillance after his release in 1996.
He was arrested within weeks for breaking into a condo where an undercover female officer had been planted during a police sting operation.
Venn was originally declared a dangerous offender.
When that status was overturned in 2000, a 16-year jail sentence was put in place, less eight years’ credit for time already spent in custody.