‘He took my boy’s innocence’

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/09/2016 (3591 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The mother of a boy who was five years old when he was briefly kidnapped and violated by a repeat sex offender says a seven-year prison sentence isn’t enough for the offender.

She shook her head during an interview following the abuser’s sentencing in Brandon provincial court on Thursday.

“He took my boy’s innocence at five years old,” she said.

As the family tries to move on, she noted how her boy, now nine, felt pride at going to the police station to make a statement and help protect other children.

“(My son) helped to put away the monster and he felt very good about himself,” the mom said.

She and relatives can’t be identified due to a publication ban that protects the identity of the victim.

Hugh Alexander McCurry, 39, was sentenced for sexual assault and kidnapping.

McCurry was a complete stranger to the victim and his family, and Crown attorney Jim Ross, who has been a Brandon Crown since 1996, says it is the only such child abduction case in the city he can recall.

On Dec. 12, 2011, at 4:30 p.m., the five-year-old boy was playing in his yard on Stickney Avenue with his four-year-old sister and his sister’s friend.

McCurry — who had five prior convictions for sex offences — pulled up in his car, opened the door and told the children it was dangerous to toboggan in that spot.

He claims that the boy climbed inside his car uninvited. The boy said McCurry told him to get in the car, pulled him in by the wrist, shut the door and drove off.

McCurry’s story is different in court documents. He told authorities that he’d seen some kids playing and had stopped his vehicle when the victim opened the car door and asked if he was a friend of his dad’s.

He said he told the child he wasn’t, and they shouldn’t be playing on the hill. He told the child to get in the car and warm up, which the boy did, and took advantage by driving off.

McCurry drove the boy to a secluded spot near the Corral Centre and the Riverbank Discovery Centre, where he sexually assaulted him before dropping him off on a street.

McCurry maintains that he prefers girls and only learned that he’d taken a boy during the sexual assault.

The child was found by police two blocks from his home within 35 to 45 minutes after he went missing, crying and with his snow jacket unzipped.

The mother questions whether police initially took the investigation seriously, wondering whether it had to do with the fact her family is aboriginal, or that she and her husband were known to police at the time.

Or, whether police thought nothing would have happened in the short time the boy was gone.

She said officers simply dropped the boy at home following the incident, but didn’t suggest he should go to the hospital.

“It was only 45 minutes, but still.”

She described her relief at her son’s return and took him in her arms.

“Oh, I was just so happy to have him back … When he got home I cradled him,” she said.

She carried the exhausted boy to bed. But, hours later, when he complained of pain, he and family were taken by police to hospital where a doctor found injuries consistent with sexual assault.

The boy also made comments to police suggesting he’d been sexually violated, his mom said.

Semen was found on his jacket, but Ross told court that thresholds for DNA in 2011 didn’t allow testing. In 2015, using improved technology, the sample was tested and detected a mixed DNA profile of both the boy and McCurry.

McCurry was on the DNA database due to previous convictions. The mom said the boy and family members were only extensively interviewed by police after the DNA hit.

In court, McCurry rested his head on his hand and stared at the desk in front of him as Ross read the facts.

After questioning why the Crown asked that he be banned from computer use as part of his sentence, he apologized — “I messed up. My mom did the best she could, my dad did. I just f—-d up.”

The victim’s father, who sat next to his boy in court, flipped McCurry the middle finger as he spoke.

As Judge Donovan Dvorak pronounced sentence, the victim’s mother kissed her son on the cheek.

“To have one’s child abducted from the safety of their yard by a stranger and sexually abused is a parent’s worst nightmare,” Dvorak said.

Dvorak delivered a total sentence of seven years in prison, based on a deal reached between the Crown and McCurry.

Ross said the boy’s memory of events isn’t strong and it would be traumatic to put him on the stand at trial in a bid to tell the court his story.

The victim’s uncles voiced their displeasure with the sentence as they left the courtroom.

“Isn’t that f—–g sickening? Seven years,” one said.

McCurry is eligible to apply for parole after serving one third of his sentence. Provided he co-operates with his rehabilitation and doesn’t get in trouble, he will be released after serving two thirds.

Outside the courthouse, relatives described how the assault changed the young victim. He has nightmares and is afraid to be out by himself, and his family says he’ll attend counselling.

McCurry confessed following his October 2015 arrest, but despite his record police released him while he was pending on his charges.

The victim’s mom says she fibbed to her son to give him peace of mind and told him his abuser was in jail.

That seemed to help him regain some confidence.

He smiled and laughed as he played with a friend outside the courthouse on Thursday.

His mom provided The Brandon Sun a copy of the victim impact statement her son wanted to read in court.

Unfortunately, his mom had the statement and was late for court due to car problems, so he couldn’t read it.

His mom wrote her son’s feelings as though she were going to read it in court on his behalf, but she said her boy wanted to read it himself. One of the lines reads:

“My son wanted to say he is glad that you are going to jail and happy you are going to jail, and happy that you are not going to hurt any more innocent girls and boys.”

It describes how the boy was once happy and goofy, and brave but after the assault he became “clingy” and afraid to go out. He blamed himself for what happened, and grew very protective of his sisters.

“His major fear is that he is going to turn out like you. He is afraid he is going to grow up and hurt little children the way you hurt him,” reads the statement.

The abuse also affected his parents.

The mother says the boy’s father blames himself for what happened — she was out shopping and her husband had been watching the children, but he stepped away briefly to check on some cooking.

His wife said he can’t forget the expressions on the girls’ faces as they came running to the house to tell him his son was “stolen”.

She said both parents sought comfort in alcohol, and their relationship was strained.

» ihitchen@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @IanHitchen

A HISTORY OF SEX-RELATED OFFENCES

Hugh McCurry’s sexual improprieties date back to when he was 14, but he has six notable entries and five sex-related convictions on his adult record:

• Dec. 9, 1999: Sexual interference. Five months time served and three years of probation. Circumstances not available.

• May 25, 2000: Indecent act in a public place and breach of probation — 90 days intermittent in jail and three years of probation. On April 22, 2000, he masturbated in the presence of a 14-year-old girl at the Brandon gallery.

• May 3, 2001: Exposure to person under 14 years old — six months in custody. On March 17, 2001, he exposed himself to two passing children, ages 8 and 11 years.

• Sept. 30, 2004: Sexual assault — six months custody and two years supervised probation. On Aug. 17, 2003, he met an 18 year-old woman and both slept over on living room floor after night out with friends. She awoke to find him fondling her as she tried to sleep.

• April 3, 2007: Sexual interference — 15 months jail and two years of supervised probation. (Historical offence). About seven to eight years prior he repeatedly touched a 10-year-old girl on her genitals with his hand and mouth — while dating her aunt and thus caring for the girl.

• Jan. 8, 2015: Sexual offence preventative order — two-year order. Not attend parks/pools/playgrounds. Not to work or volunteer in a capacity that involves being in position of trust or authority towards people under 16. Involved allegations made by two girls, but never convicted. Spent 20 months in custody before charges stayed for peace bond.

McCurry has taken some counselling but is still assessed at a high risk to sexually reoffend. When a probation officer asked about his sexual offending he responded: “There is only one sure way to stop my behaviour and that is death.”

» The Brandon Sun