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September 18, 2023 - 6:00 PM
An Ontario man now living in Kelowna was sentenced to four years in jail after he was found guilty of sexually assaulting his own daughter more than a decade ago.
The 49-year-old was tried in Ontario after his daughter told police he groped her multiple times over several years, beginning when she was at least eight years old, according to a recent Ontario Superior Court of Justice decision.
The names of the 49-year-old father and the three complainants are protected under a publication ban.
He was sentenced on Sept. 12 for sexual interference and invitation to sexual touching, sentenced concurrently to fours years imprisonment for each. In January he was found guilty, but waited this month for Justice Michael Gibson to hand down his sentence.
His daughter, who was 25 at the time of the 2022 trial, testified she was around seven or eight when he first touched her vagina and he put her hand on his penis. It then continued a couple times per year, often in her bedroom in their Kitchener home or her play fort in the basement.
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He denied ever touching her inappropriately or having her touch his penis.
The man's daughter only went to police years after she was assaulted, prompted by similar allegations by her cousin.
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Her cousin was among two other complainants in the case, however the man was acquitted of those charges.
"(His) moral responsibility is high," Gibson said. "He repeatedly sexually exploited a vulnerable young person, his daughter, in the family home where she should be entitled to feel safe, for his own sexual satisfaction, heedless of the inevitable adverse impact upon her sexual integrity and well-being."
He was charged in 2021 and subsequently moved to Kelowna to live with his parents, according to the decision.
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His defence sought a 26-month sentence with 50 days credit pre-trial custody, which would allow him to stay in a provincial correctional facility. Gibson sided with the Crown, however, when he sentenced him to four years in custody, placing him in a federal penitentiary.
He will also remain on the sex offender registration for 10 years, among other orders, upon his release.
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