Warning: This article contains content that some readers may find disturbing.
An Okanagan Falls man repeatedly sexually abused his step-daughter over several years, a Penticton courtroom heard Tuesday morning.
The man, who cannot be named due to a publication ban on anything that could identify the victim, had pleaded guilty to one count of sexual assault and a count of sexual interference of a minor on July 20 last year. But while there have been a few attempts to close the matter with sentencing, Crown lawyer Nashina Devji told the court the matter was complicated due to a dispute over the frequency and duration of the abuse.
That dispute meant hearing testimony from the victim, now aged 19, who spoke of increasing abuse over the course of several years.
The victim’s mother and biological father split up when she was in Grade 4, and her mother later met the accused at a Christmas party. After some time, the accused moved in with the family, and the victim said the abuse began gradually when she was just 10 years old.
It started, she said, with moving his hand up her leg to her genitals, and touching her over her clothes. The victim told the court that the abuse escalated, with the accused attempting oral and anal intercourse at various times over about seven years.
However, the victim said the abuse mostly took the form of vaginal intercourse, which first began on the family couch while her mother was at work. At the time, she said she had closed her eyes because she was tired when the accused took off her pants and underwear and began to penetrate her.
“It hurt. A lot,” the victim told the court, appearing nervous and at times emotional during the hearing. She said she pretended to be asleep during the incident, but made some non-verbal, vocal protest.
When she went to the bathroom, the victim said she saw blood. Because she thought it was her period, her mother went and got pads after she arrived home from work. However, she did not get her period until some years after that.
The victim said those types of encounters were less frequent at first, but after the family moved to a new house when the victim was in Grade 9, it increased to five to seven nights per week. The accused reportedly would sometimes return for “round two,” which the victim described as more painful and more forceful.
In one encounter, the victim said her half-brother walked in on the two in the victim’s room, and when the accused began to yell at the boy to get out, the victim’s half-sister came to see what was happening.
The victim said she only told a few friends about the abuse, but asked them not to say anything, because she was afraid of breaking up the family, especially after she found out her mother was pregnant with her half-brother.
“I was afraid. Because adults have power, whereas people my age, at the time, they didn’t really have a say in anything,” the victim said. “I thought maybe an adult would ruin (the) family, like they could blame it on me.”
She said she wasn’t going to say anything about it until she was in university and away from any potential blowback.
However, when the victim was 16 years old, the incident became apparent to police after the victim’s half-sister said something to her grandmother that roused suspicion. When the victim’s grandmother called her about it, the victim said she responded by asking “how did you know?”
During cross-examination defence lawyer James Pennington suggested the victim’s mother’s work schedule, which included some nights and days, would not have allowed the abuse as frequently as the victim suggested.
The victim countered that the mother was home during some of the abuse, and said her mother went to sleep before both the accused and the victim. Pennington also appeared to question the victim on how early the abuse could have started, noting she did not warm up to the accused as a father figure for a couple of years after he moved in.
It is not yet clear when a decision will be made on sentencing.