IN THE PROVINCIAL COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

[1]         Procedurally, there was a trial. What does that mean? It means that the Crown is able to bring to the court witnesses to try and prove what they say happened. The defence is given a chance to cross-examine witnesses by asking those witnesses questions. They also have the ability to have their own witnesses take the stand and tell what they know. I'll talk more about this trial procedure in a moment.

[2]         When we talk about the “criminal law” we are talking about the idea that we, as society, are bound by certain laws that restrict our behaviour. When we break these laws, we are breaking our promise to the community to abide by the same rules. And when we break the law, we are hurting and injuring not only the individual victim, but the whole community.

[3]         In this case, there is a ban on the publication of any information that may lead to the name of the complainant. For our purposes today, I will be referring to names of individuals, and names of First Nations communities in this region. If these reasons are published, I will be using anonymous initials to help ensure that the identity of individuals and communities are kept confidential.

[4]         N.J.B.M., on or about the 2^nd day of February, 2018, at or near [omitted for publication], in the Province of British Columbia, did, for a sexual purpose, touch, directly or indirectly, with a part of his body or with an object, the body of V., a person under the age of sixteen years, contrary to Section 151 of the Criminal Code.

[5]         N.J.B.M., on or about the 2^nd day of February, 2018, at or near [omitted for publication], in the Province of British Columbia, did sexually assault V., contrary to section 271 of the Criminal Code.

[6]         Why do we say "allegations"? We use this word because an accused comes before the court on a charge that has not yet been proven. The ‘onus’, and the burden of proof, is on the Crown to prove the 'elements of the offence' beyond a reasonable doubt.

[7]         What is the ‘presumption of innocence?’ There is a presumption that you, as a human being, are not the one that committed these crimes.

[8]         What are the elements of the offence? The Crown must prove a number of things beyond a reasonable doubt. I list some of them here.

[9]         In order to prove the first charge, that on February 2, 2018:

[10]      While the second charge is somewhat similar, it is important to know that it is a totally different charge.

[11]      The second charge is that of a sexual assault, and the Crown must prove that on February 2, 2018:

[12]      On the topic of consent, it is important to know that she was “under age”, as a number of witnesses have said. That means that she did not have the ability to consent to have any sort of sexual relations with a person the age of the accused. It is also important to know that she was extremely intoxicated, and even if the law provided her the ability to give her consent, her state of intoxication invalidated that consent.

[13]      To be clear, this is not a case where she ever invited, or wanted, any sort of sexual advances. To the contrary, it is a case where a young, vulnerable girl was sexually violated by a male. Even defence counsel concedes that all the elements of the offence have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, with the exception of one element. What does this concession mean? It means that it is accepted that the evidence proves that on February 2, 2018, V. was sexually assaulted by a male, that she was underage and not able to consent to any sexual activity with an adult.

[14]      The additional element of these offences is what we call identification of the accused. What does this mean? It does not mean that we need to know that this accused person is N.M. We all know that already, but the question put simply is: am I satisfied that the Crown has proven, beyond a reasonable doubt, that it was N.M. who touched V. for a sexual purpose?

[15]      The Crown has the primary or ‘legal’ burden of proof throughout the trial and must prove all the elements of the actus reus and mens rea. I instruct myself that at no time does an accused person have to prove, or disprove, anything.

[16]      On this point, the accused has not taken the stand and provided evidence for me to consider. This is a strange concept for people who often pose the question, well if he did not do this, why wouldn't he just take the stand and tell us? But a fair trial, presumption of innocence, burden of proof and proof beyond a reasonable doubt are all concepts that are behind this decision. While I appreciate he may not have taken the stand for any number of reasons, I remind myself an innocent or guilty person bears no burden. This means that they do not have to prove anything.

[17]      The accused is presumed innocent until the Crown proves guilt to the standard “beyond a reasonable doubt.” This standard of proof applies to the evidence as a whole, but generally not to individual facts.

[18]      The test for reasonable doubt, is that I must ask myself whether, on the basis of the evidence which I accept, am I convinced beyond a reasonable doubt by that evidence of the guilt of the accused?

[19]      I recognize that I must consider a number of related, but separate, principles. Even when an accused takes the stand and I don’t believe them, that would not prove his or her guilt.

[20]      With all witnesses, I may accept some of their testimony while disbelieving other parts.

[21]      I must consider all of the evidence in deciding whether there is any reasonable doubt, and any reasonable doubt must be resolved in favour of the accused.

[22]      If I believe certain aspects of a person’s testimony, I should ask myself why I believe them on these points. Equally, if I, for some reason, do not believe them, I should also ask myself, why? As well, does the evidence make sense? Even if I believe certain aspects of a person’s testimony, I still must be satisfied that the evidence is cogent and logical.

[23]      There can also be a reasonable doubt based on the absence of evidence, or a simple failure of evidence, to persuade me beyond a reasonable doubt.

[24]      In this case, credibility and reliability are important issues that I must consider. I believe it is fair to say that reliability is the central issue in this case.

[25]      I provide these points for V. and her family. In law, the credibility of a witness is not the same as the reliability of a witness. One is about telling the truth; the other is about the ability to ‘rely’ on certain things or recollections that a witness remembers.

[26]      To put it another way, credibility has to do with a person's veracity or truthfulness, whereas reliability deals with the accuracy of the witness's testimony. Accuracy involves consideration of the witness's ability to accurately observe, recall and recount events in issue. See: R. v. H.C. 2009 ONCA 56.

[27]      Any witness whose evidence on an issue is not credible cannot give reliable evidence on the same point. What this means is, if you lied, then the information cannot be reliable.

[28]      I find that all the witnesses, including, and perhaps most importantly, V., were truthful. This means I conclude they were trying their best to sincerely tell the truth to the best of their ability.

[29]      On the other hand, a finding that a witness is credible does not translate automatically into a finding that what the witness says about an event is accurate and reliable. That is, a credible witness may very well give unreliable evidence. See: Edwards v. Stroink, 2015 BCSC 1318 (CanLII) at para. 37, Gaul J.

[30]      As I said, “reliability” is a term used to describe the accuracy of evidence. It can relate to the accuracy of a scientific or forensic process, but when applied to witnesses, reliability captures the kinds of things that can cause even an honest witness to provide inaccurate information. See: R. v. Fitzpatrick, 2015 ONCJ 612 (CanLII) at para. 41, Dechert J.P.

[31]      R. v. Parent, 2000 BCPC 11 (CanLII), is an excellent guiding authority with respect to analytical approaches when considering testimony. Judges do not just guess who to believe or what to believe. When I consider the testimony of a witness, I need to assess a number of factors. These include:

[32]      I know that trials are not memory contests. He, or she, that remembers the smallest detail is not the winner. As human beings we do not remember everything and even when we sometimes remember events one way, sometimes we are mistaken. With time, memories often fade. As V. said, this crime took place a long time ago.

[33]      I also acknowledge that when a person is victimized, they do not all react the same. There is no right or wrong way to act when you are a victim. In shallower intellectual times, the law would raise questions such as, ‘why didn’t she scream or call for help?’ There were many irrelevant and improper approaches that we took in law. We now know better than to ‘expect’ certain behaviours from victims.

[34]      I also acknowledge that a youthful witness may remember things differently than an adult. For example, time might have a different feel to it.

[35]      The Crown called the investigating officer, the complainant, and her sister and friend who were with her that day.

[36]      Since V. is obviously the victim, it would be a fair question for one to ask: why do we use this word ‘complainant’? The choosing of this word is because she is the one who has brought this complaint to the attention of the police. As well, since the accused is presumed innocent, until proven otherwise, he has not ‘victimized’ the complainant. This is the usual language we use, and why.

[37]      However, for our purposes today, I will break free from the traditional use of the word ‘complainant’ and I will use the word 'victim', because I conclude that she is a victim of a crime. This is not one of those far-fetched defences, or stories, that 'she just made it up.' There is little doubt that a man sexually assaulted her.

[38]      It does not matter that she had been drinking alcohol. She is not guilty of anything. None of this was her fault. It is not her sister’s fault. It is not her mother’s fault. It is the fault of the man who did this to her and, perhaps, of his parents, who apparently did not teach the obvious point that, as a decent human being, we do not sexually abuse children.

[39]      I notice that when witnesses are asked questions such as “The City of [omitted for publication] is in British Columbia, right?” there is some confusion. This is a good example of how the Crown must prove certain things. Within this question is the idea of ‘jurisdiction’. That is, we cannot assume where [omitted for publication] is. The Crown needs to prove that “at, or near, [omitted for publication], in the Province of British Columbia”, certain things happened. If they did not, then an essential element of the charge would not be proven and the accused would be acquitted.

[40]      What is not in issue? It has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that, on February 2, 2018, V. was under the age of 16 and was touched for a sexual purpose.

[41]      In law, we also know that on February 2, 2018, V. was sexually assaulted. To put our knowledge in a different way, we know that V. was a young girl, and a male sexually touched her. He should not have. She did not consent. As our witnesses have said, "she was underage". She was too young to consent. On top of all that, we know that she was under the influence of alcohol. I only mention this because, all decent human beings should know that, no matter what age you are, no matter what the circumstances, if a person is intoxicated and passed out, you should leave them alone and respect them, or help them, but do not hurt them. Our young ones need to be cared for and helped; not disrespected and sexually assaulted.

[42]      The identification of the accused can be done in many ways. A person can see them in court and point them out. They can look at what are called photo packs – which is like a line-up of photos. Or the investigating officer might even create an in-person line-up. In other cases, circumstantial evidence can be used. For example, if my DNA was found at a crime scene, and the Crown could prove it was mine, the Crown could try and prove that I was the one that committed the offence.

[43]      In R. v. Field 2018 BCCA 253, in reviewing one of my trial decisions, the court wrote that:

[44]      In R. v. Panghali, 2010 BCSC 1710 aff’d 2012 BCCA 407, Holmes J. summarized the significance of prior acquaintance in this way:

[45]      In R. v. Keshane, 1992 CanLII 736 (BC CA), this Court, while recognizing the need for eyewitness evidence to be carefully scrutinized, also acknowledged the limits of appellate review in respect of verdicts based on such evidence:

[46]      I covered the law on identification in some detail in a previous decision R. v. Field 2016 BCPC 423. Starting at paragraph 15 I wrote:

[47]      As a minimum, it must be determined whether the witness was physically in a position to see the accused and, if so, whether that witness had sound vision, good hearing, intelligence and the ability to communicate what was seen and heard. Did the witness have the ability to understand and recount what had been perceived? Did the witness have a sound memory? What was the effect of fear or excitement on the ability of the witness to perceive clearly and to later recount the events accurately? Did the witness have a bias or at least a biased perception of the event or the parties involved? Other judicially formulated checklists provide similar factors for analysis: Mezzo v. The Queen, 1986 CanLII 16 (SCC) at 129-132 per Wilson, J. In an appropriate case, a trier-of-fact may be justified in convicting on the evidence of a single eye-witness: see R. v. Pelletier, 1996 CanLII 143 (SCC), [1996] 3 S.C.R. 601 at 601 per Lamer C.J.C. (affirming [1995] A.Q. No. 1129 (C.A.)). In this regard, at page 413 of the Nikolovski decision, Cory J. stated, “it is clear that a trier of fact may, despite all the potential frailties, find an accused guilty beyond a reasonable doubt on the basis of the testimony of a single eye-witness.” A fleeting glance of a suspect by an eye-witness is generally unsatisfactory: Regina v. Carpenter, [1998] O.J. No. 1819 (C.A.).

[48]      Once more, no evidence is perfect. No memory is perfect. Trials are not a memory contest. But in this case I find there were only two people immediately present during this attack: the attacker and the victim. DNA was located, but it was not helpful in the identification of anyone, other than, of course, that it was a males DNA. There may, or may not, have been more people in the room outside the bedroom, perhaps sitting on a couch. How many and who is very unclear. Although while I appreciate that in the mind of V., A.T. was one of the ones on the couch, I am not able to make the same inferential leaps to come to this conclusion and make no findings as to who, if anyone, was on the couch.

[49]      There were obvious differences between all of the witness’ testimony. Who went here and there, at what time, and who said what. It is not uncommon to have some differences in testimony. We recall things differently. We express things differently. At any moment in time, we also see things differently. Here is a simple example: Let’s say a car goes speeding by and there are three of us that see it. If we had to swear an oath and say what colour it was, one might say it was black, one might say it was dark blue, one might say it was dark grey. Which one is lying? Which one is telling the truth? Maybe nobody is intentionally trying to deceive the court about the colour of the car. But all I know for certain from the evidence is that, in fact, a car did go speeding by.

[50]      For the sake of brevity, I will not cover all of V.’s evidence. A short summary is that V. and her young female friend and sister went to a local motel to have some alcohol drinks with some older males. All the young girls are from the [omitted for publication] First Nation. They were in their teens. V. was 14.

[51]      What is noteworthy is that there were up to five males present throughout February 2, 2018. I understand that they were all members of the [omitted for publication] First Nation. They were in their twenty’s or thirty’s. The accused was 29.

[52]      These girls did not really know these adult men, except, it appears from the evidence in this trial, that at least two of these five adult men have bought alcohol for underage girls. Or to use the words of the witnesses, some of these guys were the ‘boot’, as in bootlegger. A.T. was one person described as ‘the boot’. K.F. was also said to have been a ‘boot’.

[53]      I pause for a moment to make this comment, neither of these two men are before the court on charges of providing alcohol to minors. If they were I would tell them this, “If you provide alcohol to young minors, you are breaking the law, and you are putting these young people at risk. At risk of injuring themselves. At risk of becoming addicted to substances. At risk of being harmed by others. It is your duty to help and care for the young ones around you. Do not buy them alcohol. ”

[54]      What did V. say about the accused? She told the court that she “did not know him before this day and had only just met him when we got to the motel room.” A.T. (AKA ‘‘A.T.’) was there. V. also said “another guy was there, but I don’t remember who he was.” In fact, I conclude there were any number of males in that room during that day.

[55]      She described the scene and confirmed that as soon as she arrived at the room she started having shots of vodka. When asked how many drinks she had she said, “I don’t remember, I don’t know, more than five shots, I was there two hours I think.” While not confirmed by any other witness, she mentioned that she had consumed three ‘coolers’ and smoked marihuana before coming to the motel room. Her interactions with the accused were limited in time, and there is no evidence of any direct memorable interaction with him. Mostly, she spent time with her sister and friend.

[56]      On the topic of alcohol, we will never know how much anyone had to drink. Different witnesses said different things. There was evidence of a ‘26er of whiskey’, a number of mickeys of vodka and beer being present, as well as marihuana. One thing seems apparent, V. says she ‘blacked out.’

[57]      She told the court that she passed out in the back room, where the bedroom is. None of the witnesses confirm this. When asked to confirm this memory of passing out in the bedroom, V. said “I kind of remember, but not really.” Her recollection is really just a guess as we do not know at all how, or if, she went from one room where everyone was, to a separate room alone with her attacker. I note, as well, that if her friend or sister knew she had passed out in a stranger’s motel room, they would not have left her there.

[58]      The next thing she remembers is waking up with a male on her. She remembers trying to push him off and telling him to stop. She described how this male sexually touched her and forced sexual intercourse on her. For the purpose of these reasons, I do not need to review the details. It is sufficient to say that she remembers being sexually assaulted.

[59]      It is extremely unclear as to the timing of this attack. Was it before or after her friend and sister left? Did she leave and come back? Was there a point in time where she did go to the back room? Who was in the hotel room when she was in the back room? There are many unanswered questions, but clearly, she was sexually assaulted. To make things even more complicated is the fact that there were two rooms on this floor of the motel that were occupied by males, with similar descriptions and, while not in evidence, I suspect the rooms may have looked similar as well.

[60]      There are many things that she does not remember, such as what she was wearing, or how she got to the bedroom, or where her friend or sister were. Some of these points, such as what she was wearing, is not probative of anything. Whether she remembers some of these details, or not, does not help us identify the attacker. However, witnesses had described seeing her at a 7-Eleven during this time period and confirmed that she was extremely intoxicated. V. has no memory of being at the 7-Eleven.

[61]      The Crown is courageous, and a bit creative in their submissions with respect to what V. knows and does not know. They ask the court to view V.’s testimony as more credible because she admits when she does not know certain things. The fact is that during this day she has been self-described as being on and off ‘black out drunk’. I am less concerned with what she does not know and more concerned about what evidence is reliable. I agree with the Crown’s proposition that intoxicated people can provide reliable evidence, but whether they do so in any case, is largely dependent on the circumstances of each case.

[62]      With respect to the identification of the accused, here is a brief summary of some questions and answers from the Crown and defence counsel.

[63]      With respect to the cross-examination process, there are different styles of questioning. Sometimes questions can come across as antagonistic or even aggressive. I note for the record that defence counsel was slow, polite and calm in this cross-examination. At one point, V. said it was happening too fast, and counsel apologized and took a different approach. He would ask a question, pause, tell V. that she could take as much time as she wanted to answer the question and then actually sat down to give her time. The cross-examination of V. was the most gentle and professional cross-examination I have witnessed in a trial. I did not find the cross-examination of V. to be fast, confusing or aggressive in any manner.

[64]      Even with testimonial aids, victim support workers, a supportive family and respectful approach in cross-examining, V.’s testimony came across as quiet and often the answers were whispered to the point of not being able to hear her. There were long drawn out pauses, sometimes lasting for minutes between question and answer. I am not certain there was anything else that could have been done to try and create a safe environment for V. to testify in. And as she told the court, she may just be a quiet person.

[65]      I realize that normally trial judges are able to consider the demeanor of a witness. However, I think it would be dangerous to assume anything of these long pauses in her testimony. One might interpret the delays in answering questions to be somewhat evasive. I did not. As I mentioned, I believed every witness was trying their best to answer the questions to the best of their ability, and V. was too.

[66]      Of course, a courtroom is inherently foreign to most and, no matter what measures we take, I understand that all witnesses suffer anxiety and stress in the trial process. Even more so when a person is young, talking about private things, and about a time when they were sexually assaulted. The ‘manner’ in which V. testified did not take away from her credibility.

[67]      I recognize that on some of these points about giving the statement or going to the hospital, whether intoxicated or not, victims often have a memory loss around the time of the trauma and their inability to recollect things can be attributed to being in shock.

[68]      (Again, I pause here to add that she also had just been sexually assaulted and that could account for her not making sense.)

[69]      In re-examination, she was given an opportunity to help us understand why she told the police it was A.T., then told the court it was the accused, and then when asked if it could have been A.T. she said “I don’t know.”

[70]      V.’s mother testified. She was able to confirm that her daughter came home upset and angry, and she learnt that V. had been sexually assaulted. Her actions show a bravery and courage that few would have at that moment. She removed her daughter’s clothes to protect any evidence that might come from them. She called the police and took her daughter to the hospital to ‘get a rape kit done’.

[71]      When I was hearing the action she took on behalf of her daughter, I was a bit surprised that anyone would have the ability to act so rationally and with such immediacy. I had a better understanding how she could react so appropriately when she told the court that she had also been raped by an [omitted for publication] man when she was 16. She qualified her comment and said something like ‘I am not putting that reserve down or anything.’ It is just a fact.

[72]      Just before going to the hospital, she drove to the motel, told her daughter to stay in the car and went to the room where her daughter said she was sexually assaulted.

[73]      She said “I knocked on the door. N.M. answered the door. And then I said ‘How dare you take advantage of my daughter,’ and he said, ‘what are you talking about?’” After doing a couple of other things, she then took three pictures of him with her telephone. Then she told the court “I went down to the truck, showed V. and asked is this the guy?” By showing this photo, in those circumstances, there is an issue of pretrial identification that needs to be addressed. The Crown argues that this event actually bolsters the in-dock identification. Respectfully, I disagree. It is also not lost on me that, more than likely, V. was not only in shock at the moment she viewed this photograph, but probably also extremely intoxicated.

[74]      In R. v. Thomas, 2017 BCPC 212, the Honourable Judge Gouge discusses why we have to be careful in pretrial identification procedures, starting at paragraph 11:

[75]      I recognize that V.’s mother was trying to be helpful.

[76]      To me, this pretrial identification has an appearance of what we call ‘police show up’ ID’s. These type of identifications take place when the only person shown to a witness is the suspect. For the above reasons, we know that this sort of pretrial identification can greatly increase the chance of an erroneous identification at the trial.

[77]      It is important to note that all the witnesses confirmed that throughout February 2, 2018, there were at least five males in and out of that room that day. Witnesses used many descriptors that applied to almost all of them. For example, ‘from [omitted for publication]’, ‘scrawny’, ‘Indigenous’, ‘brown hair’, were all common descriptors. To put it another way, we know the accused rented the room, which he was in throughout the day and he was present when she knocked on the door, but we do not have the benefit of knowing what the other individuals look like, although one witness described the accused and A.T. as scrawny with facial hair and from [omitted for publication].

[78]      I pose this question, if the accused was not there when the door was knocked on, but A.T. was there, and the photo was of A.T. and the same question was asked, “Is this him?”, what would V. have said?

[79]      During the trial, V. testified behind three different screens. These screens were designed so that she could see counsel and the judge. However, she could not see the accused. Even when she entered and exited the courtroom she could not see the accused. The main reason for this was she was extremely anxious to be in court, and did not want to see the accused.

[80]      For a moment, she came out from behind the screens and was asked whether she recognized the accused, she said, “yes” and pointed to him in the courtroom. It should be noted, however, that due to COVID restrictions, other than court staff, such as a uniformed sheriff, there was only one male in the body of the court. To put it another way, there was really only one person she could have pointed to. It has long been acknowledged that the value of dock identification has its limitations. Pointing to a person, identifying him by name and saying ‘that is the accused’ and commenting on what color of jacket he is wearing adds little to no value to the ultimate issue of whether this is the person that committed the crime. Perhaps to a jury, it has a dramatic effect.

[81]      V. had little acquaintanceship with the accused, A.T., or any of the other males she saw that day. She had just met them. She was not able to confirm any specific features of the accused.

[82]      Her ability to make observations of her attacker was limited by a number of factors. She had her eyes closed and said she only saw the face of her attacker for one or two seconds. I cannot imagine a more stressful or terrifying encounter than what she described.

[83]      The pretrial identification of the accused by looking at the photo her mother took compounds the reliability issues with respect to identification.

[84]      Her state of intoxication also undermines the reliability of her identification. What she saw, heard and remembers has been severely affected by the amount of alcohol she drank.

[85]      We do not have the benefit of a proper photo identification as the officer, for their own reasons, chose not do a photo line-up.

[86]      We do not have the benefit of circumstantial DNA evidence due to the sample being inadequate.

[87]      There is also the fact that V. told the police it was A.T. that sexually assaulted her. She said at least three times, A.T. was the name of the person that ‘did this’. Unfortunately, we do not have the benefit of knowing what A.T. has to say about any of this as he was not interviewed by the police. It appears none of the males that were present that night were interviewed. Of course, the identification of A.T. as the culprit needs to be considered in the larger context that V. was extremely intoxicated when she told the police this. So whether it is true or not, is secondary to the idea that her statement creates at least some cogent evidence pointing away from the accused. I decline to consider whether the timeline issues as submitted by defence are indicators of further exculpatory evidence.

[88]      What do we know? We heard testimony that N.M. invited underage girls into his hotel room, and that he and his friends gave them alcohol. We also heard evidence that he grabbed the butt, took off the bra and kissed one of the young girls. We also heard evidence that he surprised one of the other young girls by dropping his pants down to his ankles as she came out of the bathroom. We also heard that he kept inviting these young girls to come and sit on his lap.

[89]      These are the actions of a drunk and disrespectful man. Do I think it is possible he hurt V.? Yes, I think we all know that is a very real possibility. If I were to judge him by his behaviour towards the other two young girls, I would even say it is probable that he did this. However, possibilities and probabilities are not the standard of proof required in a criminal trial. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt means more than just a chance or probability.

[90]      In light of all the circumstances, having considered the totality of the evidence, I conclude that the Crown has not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that it was the accused that committed this terrible act of violence against this young girl. Accordingly, I acquit him of these charges.

[91]      Please do not mistake the concept of an acquittal with the concept of innocence. The accused and these other males are guilty of not taking care of these young girls.

[92]      We all share in the blame that our youth have ‘boots’ to bootleg, drink ‘hard-bar’ to get drunk, and think it is fine to bring a bong to a drunken party with a bunch of older guys that they don’t know.

[93]      It is not their fault. They are young. It is our fault for not being better teachers. Any of those young men shouldered a larger responsibility to be like a brother, or an uncle, or a father to these young girls. Instead, we now have another young girl emotionally, psychologically and spiritually scarred.

[94]      When I began these reasons, I introduced this idea: When we talk about the “criminal law” we are talking about the idea that we as society are bound by certain laws that restrict our behaviour. When we break these laws, we are breaking our promise to the community to abide by the same rules. And when we break the law, we are hurting and injuring not only the individual victim, but the whole community.

[95]      While I am duty-bound to come to the legal conclusion I have, you as a community have other options.

[96]      This case is illustrative to me that there is intergenerational trauma caused by the residential school system that has flowed from our grandmothers down to our grandchildren.

[97]      In this case, somebody from the [omitted for publication] First Nation harmed this young girl from the [omitted for publication] First Nation. A sense of harmony in our community has been lost, and needs to be restored. While perhaps I cannot conclude with sufficient certainty that one particular person is to blame for harming the community, I hope there is an opportunity to pursue restorative justice approaches to healing the communities involved.

[98]      I do not have enough cultural knowledge to make suggestions of what can be done. Nor do I think it is my place to direct communities to do certain things, and I will not. But I would welcome the opportunity to be part of any community driven restorative justice approach that might be undertaken. I have been part of healing events in other places. These healing events can be transformational.

[99]      I have invited representatives of the [omitted for publication] and [omitted for publication] First Nations to be present today for these reasons and will forward a copy of these reasons to them.

[100]   I believe they would share this idea that “everything is one and all is interconnected.” Forgive my pronunciation, but I think the word is is hišuk ʔiš c̓awaak. I believe these two First Nations also believe in the Nuu-chah-nulth way of life of to taking care of your own and building relationships or ?iisak (respect).

[101]   Indigenous females have a greater chance of being victims to spousal violence. They have an increased chance of being sexually abused while in care, and sexually assaulted when out of care. If you are a female teenager in jail, chances are that you are an Indigenous girl. We need to do something, we need to act.

[102]   If we do not act now, when will these horrible crimes against our young girls and women ever end?