Image Credit: PEXELS
May 28, 2019 - 6:00 AM
VERNON - A North Okanagan man with a lengthy history of sexual offences is facing more charges and court documents show police think he is a risk to offend again.
Joseph Vance Caron, born in 1969, is well known to the courts for various accusations and criminal convictions. He is once again before the court on two more charges involving sex offence allegations from 2013.
The Crown may also be seeking to once again have him designated a long term offender or seek a peace bond, which would allow the courts to impose conditions on him or even hold him in custody without a new conviction. The RCMP cites his past criminal record of causing 'serious personal injury' and two psychiatric reports from 2016 and 2017 identifying him as moderately high or high risk to "offend sexually in the future". He is due in court in August to answer to that application.
Caron was in court yesterday, May 17, on the other charges of sexual assault and attempting to choke or strangle to commit sexual assault. The allegations are from Armstrong and date back to September 2013.
Caron was previously convicted of sexual assault and sentenced in 2017 to more than six years in prison. He won an appeal on the conviction in 2018 and was granted a retrial that took place in March. During the retrial, the Crown stayed the sexual assault charges after the main witness was unable to testify. The Crown lawyer said at the time that staying the charges meant the case was essentially over, although the Crown has one year to reinstate the charges if they find new evidence.
Caron has a lengthy criminal record including 18 convictions including theft, common assault and sexual assault and until he succeeded in his most recent appeal, was designated a long-term offender.
According to a Supreme Court judgement from 2014, Caron was convicted of sexual assault, unlawful confinement and uttering threats in relation to a 2010 offence. Court documents describe how Caron offered two women a ride, and drove off with one of them after her friend got out to use the washroom at 7-Eleven. Caron drove his victim to the Alexis Park Church, told her to take her pants off, and proceeded to punch and choke her.
A psychiatric assessment in 2016 concluded Caron was at moderately high risk of offending sexually in the future. A further psychiatric assessment in December 2017 put Caron in the "high range" of sexually reoffending in the future.
Caron will appear in court again at a later date.
iNFOnews.ca does not have photos of Caron.
To contact a reporter for this story, email Ben Bulmer or call (250) 309-5230 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.
We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above.
News from © iNFOnews, 2019