Man gets four years in prison for sex assault of stepdaughter

The fact that a 40-year-old man was supposed to be a trusted father figure when he had sex with his 16-year-old stepdaughter appears to be lost on him, a Saskatoon judge said before sentencing the man to four years in prison.

The man, who cannot be named because the details of the assault could identify the victim, didn't think it was a criminal offence because she was “over 16,” Justice Ronald Mills told a Saskatoon Queen's Bench courtroom during a sentencing decision Wednesday.

At the outset of his trial in April, the man pleaded guilty to sexual assault causing psychological harm in connection with a single incident on Aug. 1, 2020. Consent was not possible because of the girl's age and her stepfather's position of trust and authority, Crown prosecutor Lana Morelli noted at the time. The offender had been dating the girl's mother for 10 years and knew the victim since she was a young child, court heard.

The Crown alleged there were multiple assaults, but Mills determined the Crown was unable to prove it.

After the plea was entered, Morelli called evidence during a Gardiner hearing to determine the facts on which the man would be sentenced. He alleged the victim initiated sexual contact, but Mills accepted, as fact, that the man asked his stepdaughter for sex in exchange for letting her go to her boyfriend's house. After the sexual assault, he took back the offer of letting her leave, resulting in a fight in which he pushed her and she left the house, court heard.

Mills said the girl's emotional state was already fragile before the offence, which caused a rift between her and her mother, who took her stepfather's side.

She lives with her boyfriend and can't work due to overwhelming anxiety, court heard.

A pre-sentence report outlined Gladue factors, including how the offender suffered physical, emotional and sexual abuse and lived in poverty for most of his life.

Morelli sought a sentence of six and a half years. The man, who fired his lawyer and represented himself at his sentencing hearing, argued for a jail sentence, which would mean a sentence of under two years.

Mills ruled a four-year sentence would go beyond the range for major sexual assaults against adults, reflecting the court's view that sentences for sex offences against children should be higher.