Anger after B.C. man acquitted in sex assault case because he was high on drugs
Battered Women’s Support Services (BWSS) is expressing deep concern over the recent acquittal of a man who attacked a woman in 2019 while under the influence of magic mushrooms and cannabis.
Leon-Jamal Barrett was charged with break and enter to commit the indictable offence of sexual assault, sexual assault, resisting or wilfully obstructing a peace officer in the execution of their duties, and public nudity, all concerning a bizarre series of events that occurred in the early morning hours of March 9, 2019, in Surrey.
The public nudity charge was stayed before trial.
In a ruling posted online in March, Judge Hinkson said this was an unusual case.
“There is no doubt as to whether or not Mr. Barrett did what he is accused of,” Hinkson wrote.
However, Barrett was acquitted on all charges as the judge ruled he was too high on mushrooms to know what he was doing when he violently attacked a stranger.
Barrett described a complex hallucination from the mushrooms in which he concluded that humanity was corrupt and destined to be punished.
“He was fixated on a belief that all life had started from one cell splitting into two and that he was a descendant of half of that cell,” Hinkson wrote.
“He believed God was commanding him to find the other half, a woman chosen by God, and that God would sacrifice both of them during an act of sexual congress in order to save humanity.”
This is far from being autonomous behaviour. It is clearly demonic behaviour and demonic possession. Such people are incredibly dangerous as they are capable of anything. Drugs open the door for demons and Barrett threw that door wide open.
This is the stupidest decision I have ever read from a Canadian judge, and that is saying a lot.
When a woman did not come to his house, Barrett left his home and that’s when he saw the victim getting out of her car and go around the back of her house.
The victim testified that Barrett pushed her down and assaulted her.
She was able to get into her house and lock the door, eventually attracting the attention of neighbours who called the police.
Barrett was found not criminally responsible with Hinkson accepting the defence of automatism, or actions performed without conscious thought or intention.
“This ruling is devastating. It tells survivors that their pain is real, but their pursuit of justice may be futile,” Angela Marie MacDougall, executive director of BWSS said in a statement.
“This woman fought for her life — biting, screaming, resisting — and yet the legal system sided with the man who harmed her, because he chose to get high. We cannot allow intoxication to become a shield from responsibility when it comes to sexual violence.”
In 2022, the Supreme Court of Canada struck down Section 33.1 of the Criminal Code, which had previously barred the use of extreme intoxication as a defence in cases involving sexual assault.
Parliament later amended that decision, but it did not apply in Barrett’s case.
“Survivors are retraumatized by a system that finds ways to explain away violence rather than confront it,” said Johanne Lamoureux, Manager of Community-Based Response at BWSS.
“Our front-line teams hear every day how deeply unsafe and re-traumatizing the criminal system is for those who come forward. When the courts uphold the ‘moral innocence’ of perpetrators, it reinforces why so many survivors never report in the first place.”
BWSS is now calling for an immediate federal review of how amended Section 33.1 is being applied, and whether further reforms are needed to uphold survivor rights and public education that makes clear that intoxication is not an excuse for violence.
Hit-and-run killer should spend 4 years
in prison for sex assault on teen
By Simon Little & Kristen Robinson
A man already behind bars for a deadly hit-and-run should spend an additional four years for an unrelated sex assault against a 16-year-old girl, a B.C. courtroom heard Wednesday.
That recommended sentence was submitted jointly by Crown prosecutors and lawyers for Alexandre Romero-Arata.
A jury convicted Romero-Arata of sexual assault in December 2023.
Crown prosecutor Joseph Marin told the sentencing hearing the assault, which took place at a Vancouver hotel in 2021, involved choking the victim, pulling her hair and slapping her on the face and breasts.
The assaults had a devastating impact on a vulnerable young person, who Romero-Arata — then 25 — plied with alcohol “despite knowing she was underage and struggling with substance abuse,” Marin told the court.
He added that there was no evidence Romero-Arata had insight into his actions, adding that he had taken the stand during his trial and denied any wrongdoing.
Marin also read a victim impact statement written by the girl, in which she said the assaults had ruined her self-worth.
“For a long time, I would contemplate ending my life because of it … I didn’t want to live with those memories,” she wrote.
The victim’s mother also read a statement via video link, in which she said the assaults sent her daughter into a downward spiral and broke their family.
And with all that, the Crown Prosecutor agreed to just 3 more years in prison for this lunatic. It should be closer to 30 years. The girl and her family will suffer far more than 3 of 4 years. And then she will get to watch him do something else insanely stupid. Canadian justice - sheesh!
“What was done to her was inexcusable, and it shattered every part of our lives,” she said. “Nothing could undo what the defendant did to her.”
Romero-Arata avoided looking at the mother as she spoke, keeping his gaze fixed straight ahead.
“You fractured an entire family,” she added. “The effects have been long, deep and devastating.”
Last December, Romero-Arata was handed a five-year sentence for criminal negligence causing death over a June 2022 hit-and-run that killed 24-year-old Irish man Eoghan Byrne.
The court heard he had been drinking, was driving at speeds of up to 152 km/h and ran multiple red lights. Video recorded by a passenger in his vehicle showed him, at one point, saying, “I ain’t stopping for no red light.”
Both that case and his sexual assault case dragged on for longer than expected, after Romero-Arata changed his legal counsel five times.
Crown and defence agreed the proposed sex assault sentence should be served after Romero-Arata completes the two years he still has on his hit-and-run sentence. With the totality principle applied, he would spend an additional three years behind bars when that sentence is up.
The judge is slated to rule on the submissions on Thursday.
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