Judge throws out guilty plea, sends man to trial on sex charge

Unconvinced by a joint Crown and defence sentencing submission for a two-year jail term, a Calgary judge threw out an accused sex offender’s guilty plea on Thursday.

Justice David Gates said he didn’t receive enough information from defence lawyer Katherin Beyak and Crown prosecutor Deanna Dahlseide Haase for him to accept the proposed punishment for Michael Wozny.

Instead, the Court of Queen’s Bench judge set aside Wozny’s guilty plea to a charge of sexual interference on a minor, and ordered the case to proceed to trial.

Wozny earlier had pleaded guilty to convincing a 14-year-old Carstairs girl to perform a sex act on him when the Calgary resident was selling cigarettes and drugs in the central Alberta town back in August 2014.

Wozny, 33, was on parole at the time from a five-year sentence for manslaughter, for his role in the killing of a small-time Calgary drug dealer in 2008.

According to a statement of agreed facts, Wozny had gone to Carstairs, where he met his teenage victim.

“The accused insisted the complainant perform oral sex on him,” Dahlseide Haase told Gates during sentencing submissions in October. “The complainant was afraid to say no and complied.”

Over the course of the next few days, the prosecutor said, he sexually molested her on two other occasions, including an incident he claimed to have filmed on his cellphone, even though he hadn’t.

Gates ordered the case to return to its original trial date in December, although Beyak said she’ll continue to discuss with Dahlseide Haase the possibility of resolving the case with a guilty plea.

Wozny remains in custody.