(JENNIFER STAHN / iNFOnews.ca)

A Kamloops man pleaded guilty for secretly recording sexual content of his roommate's child and prosecutors are seeking a sentence of 30 months in prison.

The offender pleaded guilty in June and Justice Sheri Ann Donegan is considering a sentence for him in Kamloops Supreme Court.

Names of the accused and complainants are under a publication ban in order to protect the identity of the victim.

The offender, 37, was living with the mother of the victim and the victim herself. He had taken voyeuristic videos of the 15-year-old victim in a bathroom at the home.

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The mother found a hidden camera in the bathroom of the house, then found video recordings of her daughter naked in the bathroom. The camera was livestreaming its recordings to the offender's phone, the court heard.

Crown prosecutor Tim Livingston is seeking a 30 month jail sentence, while defence lawyer Daniel McNamee is seeking a conditional sentence served at home, which would include mandatory counselling for his offences.

The mother reported the video to Kamloops RCMP in April 2020.

While he was living there, he was experiencing depression due to a lack of sexual activity and substance use, his lawyer said, and the victim reminded him of the former girlfriend when she was younger.

He hid cameras in the house, including the bathroom, which he used to record naked imagery of the victim while in her own home, the court heard.

Videos were recorded over the course of roughly a year, when the victim was 14 and 15 years old.

The court heard the man formerly dated the mother while they were in high school, and he became a trusted person by the young victim.

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The victim's mother had a growing suspicion that the man was recording something in the home and eventually took the man's phone while he was outside of the house.

"The videos he took of (the victim) made him feel 'alive' after feeling 'dead' due to sexual dysfunction," Livingston said to the court, based on evidence the man gave to RCMP.

When he was later arrested at a Motel 6 in Kamloops, he told RCMP officers, "It's a little extreme for taking a couple of videos," Crown prosecutor Tim Livingston told the court.

Livingston said the victim's mother found even more video footage, which dated back roughly a year when her daughter was 14.

However, police did not seize those recordings because they did not obtain a search warrant, Livingston said.

While awaiting sentencing for the child exploitation videos, the offender breached his conditions by attempting to make contact with the victim and the mother.

He sent a text message to the boyfriend of the victim's grandmother to forward a message pleading that the 15-year-old decide whether he should be "punished" and offered money to the victim, the court heard.

He was arrested again after sending the messages.

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He told a psychologist he was aware that he had earned the victim's trust. While discussing with her, he told her that the victim was spending time with him because the mother was often away or using drugs.

The offender told the psychiatrist the victim was "coming into her own" and she "looked like her mother," which reminded him of the time they dated while younger.

The 30 month sentence would be applied to the child pornography charge, while six months would be served concurrently for both the breach of conditions and the voyeurism.

He would also be prohibited from working or volunteering at any place where a person under 18 would be, and he would be on the sex offender registry for 20 years.

He is deemed to have a moderate to high risk to reoffend.

McNamee asked Donegan for the court to show "restraint and leniency" because while the man had a criminal record, none of his previous offences were sexual in nature.

The sentencing is expected to be delivered on Dec. 8, 2021.

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