Moncton, NB (Canadian Press) – The lawyer for a Mountie charged with sexual exploitation is accusing the complainant of being the one who was interested in a relationship.
“You don’t remember telling him all the fun he could have with you if he didn’t believe in God?” said James Letcher during his cross-examination of the woman Monday in court of Queen’s Bench in Moncton, N.B.
“And that no one would believe he did anything wrong because he was a Christian?”
The 20-year-old woman, who was 15 when the alleged incidents occurred in the fall of 2004 and can’t be named due to a court-ordered publication ban, said she didn’t say those things to Codiac RCMP Cpl. Alain Boulianne.
It wasn’t the only allegation Letcher tossed her way during his questioning.
The woman testified during the opening day of the trial in June that there were three separate incidents between her and Boulianne, who was a family friend.
She claims the first one involved him kissing and fondling her in his patrol car during a ride-along.
She testified he offered her gum from his mouth and when she went to take it he kissed her.
She testified the second incident involved Boulianne coming to her house one day when her parents were out and they kissed in her bedroom. Her shirt came off, and his pants came open and she ended up on the bed with him standing over her.
She also testified that the final incident was at his house, with his wife and daughters home. He touched her breasts and put his hands down her pants while she was at the computer.
During his questioning, Letcher gave his client’s version of events. He said the woman kissed Boulianne in the patrol car and the second incident at her house didn’t happen at all. The lawyer said Boulianne merely gave her spiritual guidance to help with some problems she was having and then left.
As for the incident at the computer, Boulianne’s version is the opposite: he claims he was at the computer when the girl came up from behind and put her hands on him.
The witness denied his version of events.
While the alleged incidents relate to alleged events in the fall of 2004, the woman only went to police in the summer of 2007. She told her then-boyfriend what allegedly happened with the Mountie and he was enraged at what he heard and forced her to go to police, threatening to break up with her if she didn’t.
“I didn’t at any time ever want to make a complaint,” said the woman, whose testimony was emotional at times.
She gave a statement to police in August 2007 and, as a result of that statement, Saint John Police were contacted to investigate the matter. In September 2007, Boulianne, head of Codiac’s traffic enforcement section, was suspended with pay.
On July 21, 2008, Boulianne was charged with two counts of sexual exploitation. One count alleges he touched a young person for a sexual purpose, while the other alleges he invited that person to touch him for a sexual purpose.
Justice George Rideout is presiding over the case while William Richards and Darlene Blunston are prosecuting.
Letcher pressed the woman Monday on why she continued to go to the Boulianne house after the alleged incidents occurred.
The woman explained that she had a good relationship with Boulianne’s wife and their two daughters, who were younger than her.
The trial resumes Tuesday.
Mountie’s prosecution unfair: defence lawyer
CBC News
November 24, 2009
An RCMP officer on trial in Moncton on charges of sexually exploiting a teenaged girl is being unfairly prosecuted, his lawyer says.
Cpl. Al Boulianne is charged with two counts of sexual exploitation while in a position of trust. The complainant is now aged 20 — she was 15 when the alleged incidents occurred — but her name cannot be made public because of a publication ban.
Boulianne led the Codiac RCMP detachment’s traffic division until he was suspended with pay when the allegations surfaced in 2003.
James Letcher, Boulianne’s lawyer, told the Court of Queen’s Bench in Moncton that the investigation into Boulianne was not fair.
“This is a narrow, one-[dimensional], tunnel-vision investigation” Letcher said in court.
Letcher’s charge came on Tuesday, as he questioned Annie St. Jacques, a Crown prosecutor who was involved with the case.
She had corroborated testimony from another prosecutor about a conversation involving Boulianne. They both remembered that Boulianne had stormed out of their office after the lawyers laughed at his suggestion that younger women might be attracted to older men.
Letcher tried to ask St. Jacques whether her work had ever been called unprofessional.
The judge disallowed that line of questioning, prompting Letcher to tell the court he felt his client has been unfairly prosecuted.
Complainant testified Monday
On Monday, the complainant took the stand to discuss the allegations that surfaced when she was 15. She maintained her account that Boulianne had abused her during the time she was babysitting his children.
But under cross-examination, she revealed she only told her story to authorities after being pressured to do so by a boyfriend.
She also said she had socialized with the Boulianne family several times after the incidents, and that she had once even called him for spiritual guidance during a time when she was depressed.
She broke down in tears several times on the witness stand and said that at the time of the alleged incidents, she blamed herself for everything that had happened.