Man acquitted on charges he raped, assaulted partner

A man was acquitted on five charges alleging he raped and assaulted his former partner after a judge cited concerns about the victim’s reliability due to intoxication and some inconsistencies in her testimony.

Evidence provided by the accused, 43, and a woman, 38, who reside in a small town in the Westman region were “diametrically opposed” during a two-day trial in Brandon early last month, Manitoba Court of King’s Bench Justice Scott Abel said before giving his verdict on Thursday.

“This does not mean that I disbelieve the complainant or found the accused to be a better or more credible witness. Rather, the evidence presented was insufficient for the Crown to have met its onus in the context of my analysis as required,” he said.

At the beginning of the trial, the accused, who can’t be identified due a publication ban, pleaded not guilty to sexual assault, assault by choking and three counts of assault.

The allegations included the accused raping the woman without wearing a condom on five separate occasions while their young son slept in the bed with them between 2017 and 2020.

In an incident alleged to have happened in 2019 before Christmas, the woman said she was sleeping next to their son when the accused dragged her by the hair down the hall and choked her for about 30 seconds.

In her testimony, she described feeling like she was “going to die” while she was being strangled. She alleged he then pushed her outside, smiled and locked the door, leaving her barefoot in a T-shirt and shorts in freezing weather for about 10 minutes.

Allegations for the three counts of assault included incidents when the accused hit and pushed the woman while she was seven months pregnant, kicked her in the base of her spine and pushed her so hard it made a hole in the kitchen wall, resulting in a hairline fracture to her arm.

Court heard the couple had been in an eight-year relationship that began in 2014. The woman testified she didn’t report any of the alleged violence to police until 2023 because she felt like she deserved the abuse and feared he would retaliate.

She testified she would wake up never knowing “what the day was going to bring,” but that she tried to make the best of her situation.

The accused denied the allegations and claimed she “fabricated” the incidents to alienate him from their child, adding that it wasn’t in his character “to do something like that.”

The judge said the testimony of the accused didn’t leave him with any reasonable doubt.

“The accused refused to admit facts that seemed obvious to admit,” Abel said.

“For example, despite residing with the complainant for several years, having a child together and admitting that he loved her, the accused denied in cross-examination that they were in a domestic relationship.”

He said the accused tried distancing himself from sexually assaulting the woman by saying he only slept in the bedroom when his partner and their son weren’t home or every second weekend when the son didn’t sleep in their bed.

During his testimony, the man admitted to locking the woman outside, but denied pushing her or feeling angry toward her.

“Despite not being angry with the complainant, the accused did acknowledge that after he put her outside, he called her a bitch,” Abel said.

“His calling the complainant a bitch sits in contradiction to his assertion that he was not angry with her.”

The accused also admitted to drinking and using cocaine and crack cocaine.

“When asked if he used alcohol or drugs to the point of intoxication, the accused denied being intoxicated,” Abel said.

While the man initially testified he only drank with clients after work in the presence of his partner, he admitted during cross-examination to drinking with clients in her absence.

“Given the accused’s inconsistencies in his evidence, I do not believe the accused when he denies assaulting the complainant, choking the complainant, or sexually assaulting the complainant,” Abel said.

He said the woman was “relatively consistent” with respect to the evidence she gave in her testimony and acknowledged details she couldn’t remember.

“However, I am reminded that this is not a credibility contest where I determine which side gave a more credible version of events,” he said.

Abel cited inconsistencies between details in the woman’s testimony and her police statement, including whether she was pushed in one of the alleged assaults, whether the accused smiled before he locked her outside and how she didn’t mention to police she had lost some hair when he dragged her.

Evidence from the accused said they lived in a century home with plaster behind the drywall, so the kitchen wall couldn’t have been broken by someone hitting it and the Crown never challenged this in cross-examination, Abel said.

As it relates to the injury in this incident, the man denied telling her not to speak the truth about what happened when she went to the doctor and that he did not escort her to the doctor’s office because he was watching their son. The woman testified she couldn’t recall who was watching their son at that time.

“While finding generally that the complainant was credible, I do take into account these inconsistencies. While each individually may be insignificant, the totality of such inconsistencies is factored into my analysis,” he said.

The woman also admitted to drinking and using cocaine on a regular basis, but denied having done so when some of the incidents occurred, which “could affect the reliability of the plaintiff’s evidence,” Abel said.

» tadamski@brandonsun.com