Anatomy of a sentencing hearing at the Penticton Law Courts:
Judge Meg Shaw sat for almost 4 hours listening to crown and defence lawyers on just what kind of sentence should be given to an Oliver man convicted a year ago on two serious criminal charges who has been incarcerated for 566 days segregated from the prison population.
Brian Louie, now 35, was arrested in May of 2012 and found guilty 7 months later. Those charges – assault causing bodily harm and aggravated sexual assault stemmed from an incident in a home on the reserve of the Osoyoos Indian Band at Oliver.
Louie was convicted of physically harming a sexual partner whose name cannot be released due to a ban on publication of any testimony or information that would direct attention to her. The victim was in the courtroom today and her impact statement was read to the court.
Part of the statement said she has emotional as well as physical scars from the incident and nightmares that wake her up in the middle of the night.
The crown is seeking an 8 year sentence on the sexual charge and 2 years consecutive on the assault causing bodily harm count.
Crown was represented by senior prosecutor John Swanson and the defence lawyer was Micah Rankin, grandson of Harry Rankin of Vancouver. Rankin is arguing that the sentence should not be consecutive and might be no more than 3.5 years with all served time valued with a 1.5 per day factor.
Judge Shaw will look at aggravating and mitigating factors but was asked to speak to deterrence and denunciation for what the crown calls a ‘cowardly vicious attack’ on a person who had no idea this beating was coming after having a sexual relationship at a house party.
Louie had bit the victim – spitting out a piece of flesh and then beat and kicked the women before dragging her down the home’s front stairs by an arm. Today, in court, for the first time, Brian Douglas Louie stated: “I am truly sorry for what I did.”
Louie has been in segregation at the Kamloops Regional Correction Centre for almost 19 months and his lawyer stated that his client knows he did wrong and has spent much of that time taking certificate programmes. Louie appeared in person today for sentencing but now will return to Kamloops.
It is fair to say the Crown wants federal time – over two years – suggesting better programmes for a First Nations person – while the defence is stating that the judge has other options – provincial programs, probation, conditions and limitations.
The crown is seeking a life time ban on weapons, a life time registration as a sexual offender and DNA testing for the information and data banks.
At the conclusion of presentations, Judge Meg Shaw reserved judgement in the case. Next Monday the judicial case manager will set a date for the court to reconvene for the sentencing.