Gail Blackmore, 60, leaves court during a lunch break in her sentencing hearing in Cranbrook, B.C., on June 30, 2017. A British Columbia woman wants her conviction overturned after she was sentenced to seven months in jail for taking a 13-year-old girl to the United States to marry the leader of a polygamous church. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
Republished September 14, 2017 - 5:58 AM
Original Publication Date September 13, 2017 - 4:21 PM
CRANBROOK, B.C. - A British Columbia woman wants her conviction overturned after she was sentenced to seven months in jail for taking a 13-year-old girl to the United States to marry the leader of a polygamous church.
Gail Blackmore has filed an appeal arguing B.C. Supreme Court Justice Paul Pearlman was wrong to find her guilty and imposed a sentence that is unduly harsh and excessive.
Blackmore and her former husband, Brandon Blackmore, were found guilty in February of removing a child from Canada for a sexual purpose.
Their trial heard that the girl was taken across the border in 2004 to marry Warren Jeffs, head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, who is now serving a life sentence for assaulting two of his child brides.
In his sentencing decision, Pearlman says neither Blackmore displayed any remorse for marrying the girl to a man who was 49 years old at the time.
Blackmore's lawyer, Greg DelBigio, declined to comment on the appeal.
News from © The Canadian Press, 2017