Court rejects appeal by known sex offender

Tippett was convicted of kidnapping, assaulting a young girl in Courtice

Ontario’s top court has rejected a bid by notorious sex offender Stanley Tippett to have his 2017 conviction for obstructing justice overturned on appeal.

A panel of judges with Ontario’s Court of Appeal dismissed Tippett’s appeal after hearing oral arguments — including a submission by Tippett himself — on Sept. 4. Reasons for the decision were released Tuesday.

Tippett was convicted in 2009 of kidnapping and sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl, then abandoning her in Courtice.

He is currently serving an indeterminate sentence after being declared a dangerous offender.

Tippett’s charge of obstructing justice arose from allegations that as he awaited sentencing on the kidnapping he tried to enlist the help of a fellow inmate at the Central East Corrections Centre in Lindsay to provide false evidence on his behalf.

During a trial in 2017 that inmate, Morgan Gentle, testified that Tippett provided him with several letters outlining a false narrative of the assault to prove Tippett was innocent. Tippet promised Gentle payment for making the false statement, court heard.

Tippett’s first trial on the obstruction charge resulted in a hung jury; when the matter was retried in 2017 it came to light that the original copies of the letters had been lost.

The trial judge rejected Tippett’s application for a stay of proceedings based on that development.

Tippett was eventually found guilty and sentenced to 22 months, which was to be served concurrent to his indeterminate sentence.

Tippett’s Sept. 4 appeal was based on arguments that the trial judge had mishandled evidence from Gentle, and that it was an error not to grant the stay based on the lost evidence application.

The appellate court panel rejected those submissions, finding the judge made no error in his assessment of evidence at trial. The court also found that rejection of the stay motion did not result in an unfair trial for Tippett.

Tippett was convicted of offences including sexual assault and kidnapping after a sensational trial in 2009. Court heard Tippett encountered a drunk 12-year-old girl in Peterborough in August of 2008, then loaded her into his van and drove her to Courtice, where she was sexually assaulted.

In 2011 Tippett was declared a dangerous offender and sentenced to an indeterminate prison term.

In 2015 the Court of Appeal upheld Tippett’s conviction and sentence. He was denied parole in 2016.

In 1999, Tippett was questioned by Toronto police at least three times after the disappearance of15-year-old Sharmini Anandavel.

The North York girl’s skeletal remains were found four months later, and police said she had been murdered. No one was ever charged.

Tippett vigorously maintained his innocence in that case in an interview with the Toronto Star.