BY KEITH LACEY
A senior who admitted to sexually abusing his daughter more than 30 years ago came to court Monday with his bags packed in case he was sent to jail.
Instead, Justice Yvon Renaud ordered a pre-sentence report be prepared by a probation officer before he decides the fate of the 67-year-old man.
Renaud ordered a rare publication ban against the accused telling the court revealing his identity would reveal the identity of the complainant.
The complainant, now in her early 40s, testified her father repeatedly abused her over several months when she was between ages eight and 10.
The sexual assaults happened ?at least 10 times? under similar circumstances each time, she said.
All incidents took place on Saturday evenings when her mother left the home to visit her mother. Her father would be drinking and watching hockey on television. He would enter her bedroom and take her down to the couch, remove her pyjamas and perform oral sex on her, she said.
After each incident, her father repeatedly warned her not to tell anyone, especially her mother. She never told anyone until days before going to Greater Sudbury Police two years ago.
While recalling the details and insisting the incidents happened on a regular basis, the accused could be seen at the front of the courtroom shaking his head back and forth.
The accused, who did not take the witness stand, told police on a videotape there was only one incident of sexual assault.
Even though he pleaded guilty to one count of sexual abuse, Monday?s hearing was held to determine the frequency of the assaults by the accused against his daughter.
When the hearing continues, likely in late May or early June as it takes six to eight weeks for most pre-sentence reports to be prepared, the Crown is expected to ask for a jail sentence.
Defence counsel Terry Waltenbury argued there was insufficient evidence to prove there was more than one assault. He?s expected to ask for a conditional sentence to be served in the community.
The complainant testified she ?kept everything inside? for years, but had to come forward because she wanted the secret of what happened to her out in the open.
She also suffered from nightmares, panic attacks and numerous other physical and psychological ailments caused by the sexual abuse, and her marriage was suffering as well, she said.
The oldest of five children, she grew up in an ?extremely dysfunctional family? in Sudbury where her father drank heavily on a regular basis, she said.
?He would drink until he was just babbling away, basically,? she said.
She knows the incidents happened when she was between ages eight and 10 because of many family pictures she?s in, she said.
Before the incidents, she was a ?happy go lucky, carefree kid?, but pictures taken after the incidents show a frightened child with no self-esteem, she said.
Because she was so young, she didn?t know what was going on, ?but knew inside? what her father was doing to her was wrong, she said.
Because of what happened to her as a child, to this day she trusts no one except her husband, she said.
?I kept everything inside until I was numb,? she said.
Under the advice of her doctor, she attended meetings of children of alcoholics, but left after four or five meetings because one of the participants reminded her so much like her father in his demeanour and voice, she said.
In late April last year, her father showed up without warning at her house and admitted what he?d done to her was wrong, she said.
She was extremely frightened being alone with him in her house and suffered a brief panic attack, she said.
?I wanted him out of there,? she said.
After sending a letter to her father telling him she wanted him out of her life and to have no communication with her family, her father wrote a profanity-laced letter blaming her for never forgiving him for something that happened more than 30 years ago, she said.
Deciding to go to police and going through the court process has made the past several months the most difficult of her life, she said.
?I feel like I just want to get this behind me so I can get on with the rest of my life,? she said.
When Sgt. Craig Moxam of the Greater Sudbury Police took the stand and testified how the accused turned himself into police, the accused starting sobbing uncontrollably.
When the veteran officer suggested to the accused the incidents happened more than once as his daughter suggested, he denied it and insisted there was only one incident, said Moxam.
