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Oliver boy testifies about alleged sex abuse

12-year-old South Okanagan boy testifies about alleged abuse from Tyrone Johnathan Borba.
Update: March 22, 2018 — The B.C. Court of Appeal subsequently overturned the conviction and ordered a new trial. T.J.B. was acquitted at that second trial. ---  ORIGINAL:  Warning: story contains some explicit content
Two years after their relationship ended, a 12-year-old boy testified in graphic detail this week about the sexual abuse he allegedly suffered at the hands of an Oliver man. T.J.B., 23, is being tried in B.C. Supreme Court in Penticton on single counts of sexual interference, invitation to sexual touching and sexual assault in relation to the offences alleged to have occurred from June 2011 to August 2012. Through his first two days of testimony, the boy, whose identity is protected by a routine publication ban, described how he first met T.J.B. and how their relationship progressed to one in which they regularly had sleepovers and travelled out of town together. “He was a friend of ours and it just went on from there,” said the boy, who spoke confidently as he testified via closed-circuit TV from a separate room in the Penticton courthouse. The boy told the court he woke up following their first sleepover, during which they shared T.J.B.’s bed, and found one of the man’s hands on his genitals. “I tried slowly pulling his hand out of my pants so I wouldn’t wake him ... but (T.J.B.) always seemed to wake up and instantly put (his hand) back down there,” the boy recalled. The boy went on to explain in detail how he was instructed numerous times to masturbate T.J.B. and have anal intercourse with the man. Court also heard howT.J.B. showered the boy with gifts, including a snowboard and iPod, and threatened to take them away if the boy told anyone about the sex acts. Cross-examination of the boy by defence counsel Michael Welsh was expected to begin Tuesday afternoon. Crown counsellor Catherine Crockett said she’ll call just three witnesses — the boy and his parents — and the case will ultimately hinge on the alleged victim’s credibility. Dressed in a black suit,T.J.B., who is free on bail, drank water and took notes as he watched the boy’s testimony from the prisoner’s dock.