Father sent to prison for sexual interference

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This article was published 25/09/2025 (182 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Brandon father was sentenced to two and a half years behind bars in Brandon’s Court of King’s Bench on Wednesday for sexually violating his underage daughter in 2018.

The man, 48, pleaded guilty to one count of sexual interference.

In a statement to police, he confessed that on one occasion he inserted his fingers in his daughter’s vagina for five seconds when she was between 12 and 13 years old.

“There was a significant abuse of a position of trust or authority. The offender sexually interfered with his daughter’s bodily and sexual integrity,” Justice Scott Abel said in his written decision.

A publication ban on information that could identify the victim prevents the Sun from naming the accused.

Crown attorney Yaso Mathu asked the court to impose a three-year custodial sentence, while defence lawyer Bob Harrison suggested a sentence of two years less a day served by way of a conditional sentence, which means the offender would serve his sentence from his home under strict conditions.

Abel had reserved his sentencing decision after the lawyers made their submissions in June.

In his decision, Abel outlined some of the circumstances of the offender.

He noted that the man has no prior criminal record and, with the exception of this offence, has lived a “pro-social” life.

“(He) … acknowledged the impact of the offence on his daughter and its impact on his family, the offender having separated from his spouse,” Abel wrote. “He stated that he was not thinking, and that what he did was senseless.”

The man has engaged in counselling that explored the possible factors that led to the offence and is assessed at a very low risk to reoffend, he said.

Abel said any physical contact of a sexual nature with a youth is an inherently wrongful act of both physical and psychological violence and that all forms of sexual violence “are morally blameworthy precisely because they involve the wrongful exploitation of the victim by the offender — the offender is treating the victim as an object and disregarding the victim’s human dignity.”

Since the victim was a child, Abel said it compounds the moral culpability of the offender because of the level of vulnerability in children.

Despite the mother sharing that the victim is doing “OK” now, Abel said the harm and potential harm cannot be fully known at this stage in her life.

“She is young, her sense of self is still developing. Her adult relationships will likely be affected, the extent to which is unknown. Her own psychological and emotional health will be affected, the extent to which is unknown,” he said.

Additionally, he said victims of this type of offending are more likely to have difficulty forming loving and caring relationships with other adults.

Abel acknowledged that a “carefully crafted” conditional sentence can fulfil the sentencing principles of deterrence and denunciation, but said in this context, where the offender’s moral blameworthiness is high and there is an absence of compelling mitigating factors, it would not be appropriate.

“Incarceration is required to express society’s condemnation of the conduct.”

He said after considering all of the factors, he believed a sentence of two and a half years would be fit and appropriate.

Abel also included a 20-year order under the Sexual Offender Information Act, which will require the man to register on the National Sex Offender Registry and report yearly.

» sanderson@brandonsun.com