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Child sex assault investigation leads to arrest of Hamilton tutor
By Liam McConnell
Published November 23, 2022 at 7:05 pm
The Hammer
Hamilton tutor Alistair Martin-Smith has been charged in connection to three child sexual assaults.
A private tutor from Hamilton, Ontario has been arrested on his return to Canada after three students were sexually assaulted.
Two separate sets of parents in Richmond Hill reported to York Regional Police on November 10 that their children had been sexually assaulted during private tutoring sessions.
The ensuing investigation revealed both families had separately hired the same man to teach their three children, all of whom reported attacks. All three children are under 16 years old.
Police issued a warrant for the arrest of Alistair Martin-Smith, 67, of Hamilton, on November 16. He was charged with three counts of sexual assault and three counts of sexual interference.
However, Martin-Smith could not be found. Investigators believed that he had left the country and it turns out their hunch was well-founded.
On November 23, York police announced they had arrested Martin-Smith two days prior. Martin-Smith was arrested at the airport on his return to the country.
He will appear in a Newmarket courtroom on December 20. Anyone with information about the case can call the York Regional Police Special Victims Unit at 1-866-876-5423, ext. 7071 or Crime Stoppers anonymously at 1-800-222-TIPS.
Police say there may be more victims out there and encourage any to come forward.
There is no statute of limitations on sexual assault so victims can come forward at any time, even years after the assault.
Investigators recommend victims report their assaults online as long as they are not in immediate danger, their attacker is not around, and they have access to a private email.
However, if the victim was assaulted in the last 12 days, evidence can still be collected. In this case, victims should call 911 as soon as they safely can.
York Region Police, as well as most other police services, also offer numerous victim services supports for those who do not feel ready to report.
Egypt: Sexually Abused Refugees Find No Justice
Lack of Investigation, Follow Up by Police - Cairo the most dangerous city for Women
A refugee survivor of sexual assault, Cairo, Egypt, October 16, 2019. © 2019 Reuters
(Beirut) – The Egyptian authorities have failed to protect vulnerable refugees and asylum seekers from pervasive sexual violence, including by failing to investigate rape and sexual assault, Human Rights Watch said today.
Human Rights Watch documented 11 incidents of sexual violence committed in Egypt between 2016 and 2022 against seven Sudanese and Yemeni refugees and asylum seekers, including one child. All six women, including a transgender woman, said that men raped them, and four said they were assaulted in two or more incidents, while the child’s mother said a man raped her 11-year-old daughter. Three said the police refused to file incident reports, three said they were too intimidated to report the incident at all, and one woman said a police employee sexually harassed her when she tried to report a rape.
“Not only are refugee women and girls in Egypt living in vulnerable situations at risk of sexual violence, but the authorities seem to have no interest in protecting them or investigating the incidents, let alone bringing the rapists to justice,” said Lama Fakih, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “The authorities’ evident lack of interest in these cases leaves refugee women with no place to turn for justice.”
Sexual violence against women and girls in Egypt has been a pervasive problem in recent years as the government has largely failed to establish and carry out proper policies and investigation systems or enact necessary legislation to address the problem. In 2017, a Thomson Reuters Foundation survey stated that Cairo, where more than a third of refugees in Egypt live according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), was the world’s most dangerous megacity for women.
Many refugee communities in Cairo and Giza are located in poorer neighborhoods and areas with high crime rates. This exacerbates the risks for refugee women and girls, whom attackers already appear to target based on their actual or perceived vulnerability linked to poverty and legal status.
Human Rights Watch interviewed six women and the mother of the child, three aid workers, and a lawyer, all in Egypt. In four cases, Human Rights Watch reviewed additional evidence including photographs and medical reports corroborating the accounts.
All six women said they experienced severe physical effects of the rape, such as bleeding or inflammation, difficulty walking, bruises, soreness, and other injuries. Three of the rapes resulted in pregnancy. Police referred none of the four who approached them to forensic or health care services.
Survivors also reported several psychological issues including sleeping problems, constant feelings of fear including of being followed, anger, frustration, depression, and memory issues. The transgender woman said she had suicidal thoughts.
Most transgender women have suicidal thoughts.
Five of the women are Sudanese, two refugees and three asylum seekers registered with UNHCR. The other two are Yemeni, one a registered refugee and the other a registered asylum seeker. All arrived in Egypt between 2016 and 2020. One rapist was from Syria, another from Sudan, and the rest were Egyptian. At least one attack, in which the woman was abducted and repeatedly assaulted, appears to have been racially motivated. The survivor reported that the Egyptian rapist said, “let us enjoy this Black skin color.”
The women all said they could not afford to hire a lawyer.
There is much more on this story at Human Rights Watch
P.E.I. man sentenced to 7 years for sexually assaulting young girls
Case 'demonstrates the very worst of human behaviour,' judge says
So, how come he only got 7 years? Canadian judges are so pathetic!
CBC News ·
Posted: Dec 05, 2022 5:03 PM AT |
Warning: This story contains disturbing details.
A Kings County man was sentenced to seven years in prison Monday after pleading guilty to sex offences involving three children — two of them his young relatives.
There is a publication ban protecting the identity of the victims, so CBC News is not naming the 57-year-old offender.
The victims, now teenagers and accompanied by their families, broke down in tears at times during the sentencing in P.E.I. Supreme Court.
One of the victims was the offender's granddaughter, another was his step-granddaughter, and the third was one of their friends.
According to the agreed statement of facts presented in court, he sexually assaulted the three girls on several occasions over the course of several years in the Three Rivers area, often without using protection. The assaults happened inside his home, in his car, and at other locations.
His youngest victim, his granddaughter, was just five when this started.
The crimes continued until last fall, when the victims told their parents, who went to RCMP.
The man was arrested, and has been in jail ever since.
He pleaded guilty to one count of incest and two counts of sexual interference. Twelve other charges were stayed.
He ruined innocent lives and so many childhood experiences that should be happy
and joyful. All I see is pain and suffering.
— Teenager who presented victim impact statement
After the plea, one of his victims gave an impact statement to the court, choking back tears as she described how much he hurt her.
"He made me hate myself and my body. He made me feel vulnerable and useless," she said.
"He ruined innocent lives and so many childhood experiences that should be happy and joyful. All I see is pain and suffering."
Judge Jonathan Coady accepted the Crown and defence joint recommendation of a seven-year prison sentence, minus time served.
So it's not so much the judge's fault as Crown Counsel's unthinkably pathetic sentence recommendation. The man abused 3 kids for years, destroyed their childhood and sorely affected their adulthood, and they will probably still be teenagers when he is released. How is that 'justice served'?
He noted that the sentence would have been longer if not for the fact the offender pleaded guilty, saving the victims from the trauma of having to retell their stories at trial.
The case "demonstrates the very worst of human behaviour," Coady said.
"The harm cost by these offences is real, profound, and will remain…. That harm is impossible to measure or quantify.
"No sentence imposed by this court will remedy the harms."
No, but a decent sentence might protect some other children from being destroyed by this pervert. It appears neither the Crown Counsel nor the judge considered that. Children always end up paying for the insanity and stupidity of man.
Former Norfolk football coach who had 159 child sex victims
9th December
By Peter Walsh
Eastern Daily Press
A school worker and football coach posed as a teenage boy in order to carry out sex offences on more than 150 children.
Jonathan Clarke, 32, a supervisor at Thorpe St Andrew High School, created a false profile on a number of social media accounts, presenting himself as two teenage boys to chat with his victims and engage them in sexual activity.
Clarke, who also worked as a football coach with Soccer Stars at a number of Norfolk infant and primary schools, would get victims to commit the acts of sexual activity online.
He also threatened to expose some of them for what they had done or harm their families if they did not do as he asked.
In all, Clarke admitted 54 charges spanning more than a decade and asked for a further 127 similar offences to be taken into consideration.
There were a total of 159 victims, all under 16.
His offences, carried out between 2010 and 2022, included the making of indecent images, sexual communications with a child, inciting children to engage in sexual acts, voyeurism, and blackmail.
Norwich Crown Court heard Clarke was arrested on January 6 this year following a police investigation into social media messages where victims were encouraged to send nude images.
It came after concerns were raised to the safeguarding lead at the Thorpe school about someone purporting to be a child online.
The victim had been contacted by the defendant via social media and asked to take their clothes off, exposing their breast and genital area.
Detectives from the specialist Safeguarding Children Online Team (SCOLT) carried out enquiries into the communications and obtained an IP address linked to Clarke’s home.
Clarke was arrested and a search carried out at his former address in Highview Close, Blofield, where officers seized 14 electronic devices including eight laptops.
Police initially found around 200 indecent images ranging from Category A, the most serious, to Category C. A total of 5,017 indecent images and videos of children were ultimately found.
Clarke appeared at court on Friday (December 9) for sentencing during which Marc Brown, prosecuting, read out statements from some of the victims and their families.
The mother of one victim, who described Clarke as a "predatory monster", said she felt she had "failed" her child as a result of what they were subjected to.
She said what Clarke did to her child would affect them for the rest of their life.
One victim described how they were “shocked and disgusted” when they learnt the ‘boy’ they’d been chatting to online was a man.
Another victim described what happened as "terrible" and added it had affected both their confidence and trust in people.
Passing an extended sentence of 27 years - made up of 19 years imprisonment and eight years on licence - Judge Alice Robinson said Clarke had committed a "catalogue of online sexual abuse of children".
It's disappointing! Clarke will be out in ten years when many of his victims will still be in their teens. He should be made to serve the entire 19 years.
Judge Robinson said the impact of this offending has caused "serious psychological harm" to his victims.
Judge Robinson praised police for their work in this "difficult and distressing case" during which his "depravity has been revealed".
Michael Clare, mitigating, said Clarke was entitled to full credit for his guilty pleas.
At the time of his arrest, Clarke worked at Thorpe St Andrew High School as a lettings assistant and cover supervisor. He also worked for Soccer Stars, a company which operated after-school clubs.
Through Soccer Stars contracts, he taught PE lessons at Lingwood Primary School and after-school football clubs at Brundall Primary and Lionwood Infant and Nursery School. Clarke also coached teams at Blofield United Youth Football Club.
When the allegations first came to light, Clarke was immediately suspended from all roles and was later dismissed.
Speaking after the case, Senior Investigating Officer Detective Inspector Dave McCormack described Clarke's offending as "horrendous ".
He said: "Clarke was predatory and manipulative in his offending and it’s pleasing he’s behind bars where he can no longer pose a danger to children.
“This result wouldn’t have been possible without the support of victims, their parents and the schools and football club who have provided unwavering support to make sure we get the right result for victims."
Clarke was put on the sex offenders register for life.
Anyone who has concerns about someone online can report it to police by calling 101.
The NSPCC also operates helplines and anyone who has concerns about a child’s safety should email help@nspcc.org.uk or call 0808 800 5000.
Norfolk, UK
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