Regina man gets house arrest for 2007 sexual assault of 4-year-old girl
CBC
WARNING: This article contains details of abuse.
A man convicted of sexually assaulting a then four-year-old girl in his Regina home nearly two decades ago will now serve his conditional sentence in the same place where the assault happened.
Edwin Woolhether, 68, was sentenced Friday to two years less a day by a Regina Court of King’s Bench judge.
He will serve his time in the community, remaining inside his approved residence for 24 hours a day, unless he has written permission to be elsewhere.
Woolhether is subject to numerous conditions, including completing 250 hours of community service before the end of his sentence. He must also comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act for the next 20 years.
He was convicted of one count of sexual assault and found not guilty of sexual interference for touching his young neighbour in the bathroom while they were alone together in 2007. The girl was four years old at the time, according to the decision.
His defence lawyer Jared Aumiller called the ruling unique, noting that the presiding judge, Justice Darin Chow, did not find there was touching "for a sexual purpose."
"Given the uniqueness of that verdict, we're happy that a community-based sentence was decided upon by the judge," Aumiller said.
In his written decision for the verdict, Justice Chow said Woolhether’s motive for touching the victim is "legally irrelevant" for the sexual assault conviction, as his actions clearly violated her.
But he found there was reasonable doubt for the sexual interference charge.
Woolhether’s evidence argued there was no sexual purpose in the touching and that he "derived no sexual gratification from doing so," according to the decision.
Chow wrote that while he was "unable to accept" that evidence, "after careful consideration of the evidence as a whole, I am certainly left with a reasonable doubt by it."
Aumiller said people underestimate the impact a conditional sentence can have on someone’s freedom and liberty.
"It's not that he's coming out of the courthouse a free man. There's restrictions on his liberty for quite possibly the rest of his life," he said.
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