Moncton, N.B. (CBC News) – A judge has adjourned until Dec. 8 his decision in the case of a Moncton RCMP officer charged with sexually exploiting a teenaged girl.
During closing arugments on Thursday, Justice George Rideout of the Court of Queen’s Bench asked the Crown prosecutor if he was seeking a mistrial.
Prosecutor Bill Richards had argued that Cpl. Al Boulianne’s testimony contravened the judge’s earlier ruling that the complainant’s previous sexual history couldn’t be entered as evidence.
Richards told the judge he was not seeking a mistrial “because I know you’ll take it into account.”
Boulianne, who was the head of the Codiac RCMP detachment’s traffic enforcement section, is charged with two counts of sexual exploitation while in a position of trust.
The complainant, who was 15 years old at the time of the alleged incidents in 2004, cannot be identified under a publication ban.
Attacks testimony
Boulianne has been suspended with pay since 2007 when the allegations against him surfaced. He told the court the girl was the one who made sexual advances and that he spurned them.
The prosecutor described Boulianne’s testimony as a “slash and burn character assassination” of the complainant. He pointed to Boulianne’s assertion that the girl had been into drugs, alcohol and sex since she was 12.
Defence lawyer James Letcher argued the complainant’s stories did not add up and that she didn’t act like an abused person because she had bragged to a friend that she was involved with an older man who had a wife and children
Letcher also suggested the complainant’s motivations for going to the authorities were clouded by her “turbulent and troubling life at the time.”
The court heard that the girl’s boyfriend was threatening to leave her unless she filed a complaint and that she had recently found out she was pregnant by that boyfriend.
The prosecutor argued that the fact Boulianne didn’t tell his wife or his superiors what was going on constituted an inconsistency in his story. “He’s a police officer trained in evidence and preserving the crime scene,” said Richards.
He also pointed out that Boulianne had shredded a ride-along waiver signed by the complainant, which coincided with one of the alleged incidents.
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