Having difficulty moving after being sentenced to jail for possession of child pornography, a heavy-set Windsor man had to be wheeled out of Ontario court Friday to start his journey to jail.

Dennis Artinian, 53, was sentenced to the six-month mandatory minimum after pleading guilty to possessing thousands of images of children, some as young as eight years old, in sexualized positions.

“In order for there to be child pornography, children have to be violated,” Ontario court Justice Micheline Rawlins said. “These are human beings … it’s just so wrong on so many levels.”

In addition to jail time, Artinian was placed on three years probation, during which time he’s been ordered to undergo counselling and stay off computers unless required for work. He’s also been ordered to stay away from places where children under 16 congregate, as well as from working or volunteering in places serving children, for a period of 10 years.

Artinian, who had no prior criminal record, was also instructed to provide a blood sample for a police DNA registry, and his name will remain in a sexual offenders’ registry for the rest of his life.

Artinian was arrested on March 27, 2013, after members of the Windsor Police Service Internet Child Exploitation Unit executed a search warrant at his home in the 600 block of Bridge Avenue following a month-long investigation.

Contained in the computers and storage devices seized were 4,784 images and 79 videos depicting child pornography.

After Artinian’s sentencing was adjourned repeatedly over months due to no-show claims of illness, defence lawyer Travis Hughes, again without his client Friday, was ordered by the judge to bring him in.

“Enough is enough,” said Rawlins, adding she had yet to see any doctor’s medical note. Breathing heavily and labouring on a cane as he shuffled slowly to the front of the courtroom, Artinian made his appearance hours later.

“For what it’s worth, Mr. Artinian is very, very sorry,” said Hughes, adding his client has been “very hard on himself for this.”

Asked by the judge whether Artinian had anything to say for himself prior to sentencing, the convicted sex offender simply shook his head silently.

dschmidt@windsorstar.com

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A convicted Windsor voyeur, sentenced Friday to 20 days behind bars on weekends, no longer has a home to return to during the week.

“His house is for sale, he’s living with family members,” lawyer Michael O’Hearn said of his client, Thomas Chauvin. “He will not be returning to that house.”

Chauvin, 57, vacated his longtime home after news became public last week that he was guilty of secretly filming his neighbour, on repeated occasions, as she visited his bathroom.

Chauvin was escorted out of the courtroom for immediate transfer to London, where he will start serving intermittent weekend jail stints. Ontario court Justice Micheline Rawlins said Chauvin had shown remorse by pleading guilty and foregoing trial. “That was very helpful,” said the judge, who had previously described how traumatic such a trial can be to the victim.

Rawlins also placed Chauvin on probation for three years during which time he must attend any counselling as advised by his probation officer, and he was ordered to provide a blood sample for a police DNA databank. He’s also forbidden from attempting to contact the victim or her family and is forbidden from possessing or operating any recording device outside his residence or, when at home, inside his bathroom.

If he puts a recording device in the kitchen, the judge explained, “All you’re going to capture is people cooking.”

At the start of his sentencing hearing a week earlier, the victim, who cannot be identified due to a court-ordered publication ban, said she was “still in shock” by what had been done by her next-door neighbour, whom she trusted as a brother. She said she was on medication, taking counselling and “living a nightmare.”

At the time, Rawlins said the court couldn’t order Chauvin out of his home but that one of the parties would have to leave given the “total violation” of trust. The victim, who described herself as “an emotional wreck” in court, later told The Star she felt forced to put her home of 29 years up for sale.

It was one of the victim’s sons who discovered the hidden camera and recording device when he accidentally tipped over a laundry hamper as he was using the same bathroom. Later confronting the neighbour, the victim’s family demanded and received recordings depicting 29 images of the mother taken over several years.

Assistant Crown attorney Scott Kerwin had sought a 30-day jail sentence. He also asked that the weekend stints in jail be limited to Saturdays and Sundays because any portions of Fridays and Mondays are calculated by the justice system as full days. The judge ruled that Chauvin’s weekends in jail would run from 7 p.m. on Friday to 6 a.m. on Monday, with each weekend thus counting as four days served.

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The accused himself, former Windsor Spitfires hockey player Ben Johnson, will be the last to testify when his sexual assault trial resumes in August.

A year to the month after the criminal trial began, Ontario Justice Micheline Rawlins wished all the parties an enjoyable summer Friday after the court heard from the first witness for the defence, Krooked Kilt owner Jason Codling.

The trial is scheduled to continue Aug. 24 to 27.

Johnson, 21, is charged with one count of sexual assault in relation to a Jan. 13, 2013 incident in which he is alleged to have barged in on a young woman using the men’s washroom at the Krooked Kilt bar, grabbed her hand and forced her then to touch his exposed penis.

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Sentencing Sonny St. Martin, a man with a long and violent criminal history, to nearly four years in jail was the easy part for a Ontario Superior court judge Thursday.

“The most contentious issue,” Justice Renee Pomerance told a court hearing Thursday, was ordering the victim not to see her tormentor for a three-year period after he gets out of jail.

Begging the court not to impose a non-association order, Jessica Rushlow earlier told the judge that nobody knows St. Martin like she does. She described the man who tried to run her down in a pickup as having “a kind heart,” and that she wants to eventually marry him and grow a family together.

St. Martin’s lawyer, Ken Marley, had urged the court to respect the wishes of “a competent adult, able to make her own decisions.” But assistant Crown attorney Elizabeth Brown urged the court to rule against the victim’s wishes, “to protect herself and her children.”

The last time they were together, on July 7, 2013, the pair was driving home, with Rushlow behind the wheel of her pickup, when an intoxicated St. Martin, 28, flew into a violent rage, kicking at the dashboard and then slapping and punching his pregnant partner. After she fled on foot, he grabbed the wheel and raced after Rushlow, who darted behind a tree before the vehicle missed her and slammed into a house.

Initially charged with attempted murder, St. Martin pleaded guilty to assault with a weapon (the weapon being the pickup).

At Thursday’s sentencing hearing, the judge said there are rare cases where “the need for protection will override the victim’s freedom of choice.” Even if she were willing to allow Rushlow “to gamble with her own safety,” Pomerance said she could not allow the woman to gamble with the safety of her three children, the youngest of which is St. Martin’s child.

The Crown had suggested there were other assaults on Rushlow, including an incident one month after they first started dating in November 2012, when police responded to her home and found her bleeding with a broken jaw. Rushlow told police of another time she’d been assaulted by St. Martin.

The victim subsequently testified that St. Martin hadn’t assaulted her in the former incident, and she later withdrew the latter allegation. Pomerance said “recantation is a notorious problem” in domestic violence cases, but she  added those two cases were not a factor in sentencing.

But the judge said she was attaching weight to St. Martin’s sizeable criminal record, with over 40 convictions since 2004 . Many of those were for crimes of domestic violence.

“Mr. St. Martin has, in the past, assaulted, threatened, criminally harassed and choked his partners,” said Pomerance, reading from her 19-page decision.

Rushlow told the court she believes St. Martin’s violence stems from drinking, but the judge indicated he had been sober when, following his latest arrest, he attacked and seriously injured a fellow inmate who had refused to smuggle contraband into jail. “The video is chilling,” said Pomerance, adding the victim required facial reconstruction surgery and the removal of all his teeth.

Describing the sentence jointly proposed by Crown and defence as “lenient,” the judge nevertheless agreed to their suggestion for an additional 11.5 months behind bars, for a total equivalent sentence of 46.5 months for the pickup and jail assaults. St. Martin has been in pre-sentence custody since July 2013.

Hearing he was barred from associating with the victim during his three-year probation after jail, the muscular St. Martin hunched forward and started mumbling to himself in the prisoner dock, leading to court staff calling in extra police security. Pomerance said if St. Martin showed progress with the intensive substance abuse and anger management counselling, he could apply for an earlier end to the non-association order.

St. Martin is prohibited from driving during his probation, and he was handed a lifetime weapons prohibition and ordered to submit a blood sample for a police DNA databank. A copy of the judge’s order will be given to the local Children’s Aid Society office.

Victims of domestic violence “often return to, or remain with, a violent partner despite the risk of future harm. In extreme cases, this can lead to tragic, even fatal, outcomes,” said Pomerance, who cited a recent Ontario chief coroner’s review of domestic violence deaths.

“For far too long, domestic violence was erroneously seen to be a private or family matter, leaving victims with little or no protection,” said Pomerance. While “the wishes of a victim are relevant … it is the public interest that must prevail.”

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A Windsor man discovered Thursday that steaks can cost a lot more than even the steep price on the label for such a choice cut of beef.

Alfio Papa, 44, was handed a suspended sentence but made to pay a $100 victim surcharge after pleading guilty to exiting a Tecumseh Road East Zehrs store on Feb. 10 with two packages of stolen steaks — valued at $48 — concealed in his jacket.

Papa, who is single and living on a disability pension, was also placed on 18 months probation, during which he’s prohibited from attending any Zehrs or Real Canadian Superstore.

“He simply didn’t have the money to pay,” defence lawyer Maria Carroccia told Ontario court Justice Lloyd Dean. Outside court, she said Papa, who has a prior record, has been “down on his luck.”

“The right thing to do would be to avail yourself of the services that are out there … and not steal steaks from Zehrs,” Carroccia said.

The judge, who was advised the convicted man before him may have once been a high school classmate, accepted the proposed sentence jointly suggested by the Crown and defence, and he wished Papa good luck.

“Thank you, your honour,” Papa replied.

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The daring young woman whose username was Lilsecrett has pleaded guilty to an act that was anything but — a live Internet sex show at the Windsor Public Library that made headlines across the continent.

After pleading guilty Monday to committing an indecent act, Alexandria (Alexa) Morra, 22, was sentenced to 12 months probation during which time she may not enter a public library in Windsor or Essex County. She was also fined $250 and must submit her DNA to a national registry.

The Tecumseh woman, who was dressed in a conservative black top and pants and whose hair appeared lighter than when she made her notorious videos, declined comment outside court, where she climbed into a waiting car and left.

Her lawyer Patrick Ducharme said she showed remorse by pleading guilty at the pre-trial stage.

“She dealt with it, she admitted it, she identified herself to police,” Ducharme said, noting that she turned herself in March 6. “She suffered a lot of public embarrassment because it truly did go viral.”

Ducharme said his client will now likely have a harder time landing a job, given her criminal record. He said she only filmed her performances to make money, since she was and remains unemployed, earning a total of $1,500 for her shows.

She was live streaming on MyFreeCams, a site that allows fans to interact with performers.

“She performed in front of one adult who knew exactly what her performance was going to be because he was directing it. He wanted her to do it in a public library,” Ducharme said. “And no one else apparently saw her.”

Ducharme was prepared to argue that her act was not indecent. No bystanders noticed her, after all.

“A lot of people would think this is a slam-dunk case because there is video tape of exactly what she did in the library,” Ducharme said. “But the legal issue is, how does our country define indecency?”

Ducharme said years ago he defended about 160 erotic dancers who were charged with indecent acts for performances in various clubs, including in Windsor, and that eventually every one was declared not guilty.

Still, he said Morra decided to plead guilty because she wants to put the issue behind her.

“She acknowledges what she did was inappropriate,” Ducharme said.

He said Morra is looking for work and plans never to make pornography again.

According to the facts read in court, library officials became aware of a sex show Dec. 29 when a man called the Riverside branch of the Windsor Public Library to report it. A library worker looked around and found what seemed to be Morra in mid-show.

She had one leg in the air and the other spread in front of a laptop with a cellphone pointed at her crotch, according to the facts.

She was asked to leave immediately, which she did without incident, saying only, “Oh, yeah.”

Police later reviewed a 3 ½-hour sexually charged video featuring Morra.

“During the video Morra exposes her genital area and is seen to be masturbating,” according to the facts, which noted that she borrowed a pen from an unsuspecting man behind her. “Morra continues to use the borrowed pen as part of her sexual performance, placing it between her exposed breasts, and at one point inserting the pen into her vagina while masturbating in a sexual manner.”

Ontario Court Justice Greg Campbell had harsh words for Morra in the courtroom.

Campbell called Morra’s act vile and noted that children could have seen her. He said Morra should have more respect for herself and the community. She did not address the court when given the opportunity.

For three months starting in November, Morra reportedly live-streamed dozens of shows from study desks at the Riverside and Fontainebleau branches as unsuspecting people, including children, went about their business nearby.

Windsor police investigated after a public uproar resulted when media reported that someone going by the username Lilsecrett was exposing her breasts and more for live performances at Windsor libraries.

Assistant Crown attorney Tom Meehan said Morra is a youthful first-time offender, though he noted that her actions were nevertheless offensive.

“It’s an unusual case,” Meehan said. “The fact that somebody thought they could do that and it’s no big deal is disturbing.”

• Windsor libraries latest to be used as live sex show venues
• Woman who allegedly performed live sex shows in Windsor libraries turns herself in
• Windsor libraries get overhaul after live sex show saga
• Patrons shocked, amazed by long-running Windsor library peep show
• Police probe porn shows at Windsor Public Library

Alexa Morra, 22, leaves the Ontario Court of Justice on Monday, June 22, 2015, after pleading guilty to an indecent act for her sex show at the Windsor Public Library. She was given 12 months probation and a $250 fine. (DAN JANISSE/The Windsor Star)

A dispute between Leamington neighbours over the alleged theft of marijuana plants escalated from threats to mischief and then arson and violence, a Superior Court of Justice trial heard Monday.

But even though he claims to have witnessed the graffiti being sprayed on a home and then the fire being set, Richard Larocque testified he didn’t talk to police and point the finger at Jay David Shanks until he himself became an alleged target of the violence.

“I was in a lose-lose situation,” Larocque said of his decision to co-operate with the authorities months after a suspicious fire at 35 Bayview Place on July 8, 2013. He said he wasn’t divulging anything to police but that he was still being physically assaulted and threatened with worse if he dared to ever snitch.

“I was tired of being threatened, and I was tired of being smacked around … I was tired of running scared,” Larocque told Justice George King.

Shanks, 55, is on trial on nine counts that include arson, mischief, assault, intimidation and breach of probation.

Larocque, the first of the prosecution’s witnesses, said Shanks blamed one of his neighbours — whom he’d put in charge of minding his medical marijuana plants while he was away — for stealing them instead. What allegedly came next was an escalating series of threats and actions aimed at getting that neighbour out.

Larocque said he was on Shanks’s porch with others on May 15, 2013, when an intoxicated Shanks crossed the road to 35 Bayview Place and spray-painted a rat and a misspelt “thief” on the wall. Larocque, who testified he lied to police at the time when asked about whether he had witnessed the incident, said there was another graffiti attack on May 20, and that he also watched from the porch as Shanks allegedly lit and then lobbed an incendiary device into a window of the home on July 8, 2013.

“He was hellbent on getting him out of the neighbourhood,” said Larocque, who described himself as friends with both men.

After allegedly setting the fire, “he was very aggressive … he just kept telling me to shut up, and he kept smacking me in the head,” said Larocque. “I’m shaking and distraught,” he added.

The following January, after alleging Shanks knocked him unconscious and gave him a concussion, Larocque said he met with police at the hospital and gave his story.

“I seen him spray-paint graffiti on two occasions, and I witnessed him start a fire,” Larocque testified.

Under cross-examination by defence lawyer Ken Marley, however, the witness had to concede that he was an alcoholic and often “on my way to getting intoxicated” at Shanks’s residence, where he visited to also buy pot and duty-free cigarettes which Larocque said Shanks bought off a reserve.

“I’m bad at remembering things,” Larocque said before agreeing with the defence that, perhaps, the second instance of graffiti might have actually never happened.

Marley said it was “convenient” that Larocque couldn’t remember the names of all the other guests he said were also at the Shanks residence and witnesses to the same alleged wrongdoing.

“Are you suggesting I’m fabricating all of this?” Larocque said at one point.

“Absolutely, sir, I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Marley responded. He said Shanks was “nowhere near that house” on the day of the arson.

Marley said it was “nonsense” that Larocque, allegedly hearing in advance that Shanks intended to burn down his neighbour’s home, wouldn’t have alerted the police or at least warned his targeted friend.

The trial continues in Windsor this week.

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Saying the court had to deliver a strong message of deterrence over the “outrageous conduct” of a former educator who stalked his ex-wife, a Windsor judge more than quadrupled the jail sentence the prosecution had been seeking.

The criminal harassment and “malicious campaign” at the hands of a man described as a “beloved teacher” has had a tragic lasting impact on his ex-wife and their children and “is not to be tolerated by society,” Superior Court Justice Richard Gates said Tuesday.

The man, described as well-educated and a talented musician involved in the community, including sitting on the board of a local housing co-operative, can’t be named under a publication ban that protects the identity of his ex-wife.

In a lengthy 26-day trial, more than half of which was taken up by the defence cross-examining the complainant, the judge heard of a jilted husband who would crash block parties and a Mommy and Daughter Tea at school, drive by her house incessantly while revving his engine and seek to get a neighbour to spy on her.

The woman first complained to police more than seven years ago about being stalked by her ex-husband. Charges of assault and sexual assault were withdrawn in 2007 in exchange for a peace bond, but he ignored the restraining order and continued the stalking behaviour. At one point, he called the Children’s Aid Society on his ex-wife’s boyfriend and made a false report.

Police attended the woman’s home almost 40 times, the judge said, adding a campaign of “humiliation” continued at her church, with the man’s father erecting a sign in the back of his pickup and parking it outside, directed at parishioners.

The judge referred to a pre-sentencing report which described the man, who has no prior criminal record, as lacking any empathy for the victim and refusing to accept responsibility. He feels instead that his ex-wife was manipulating the justice system for her own ends.

The man has been diagnosed with depression and is living on a disability pension, but the court heard he hopes to return to teaching. He used to teach for the Greater Essex County District School Board.

In addition to an 18-month jail term — the Crown had sought three to four months imprisonment, while the defence had argued for a suspended sentence or house arrest — the man was placed on three years probation. He is banned from owning weapons for 10 years and was ordered to supply a blood sample in order to be registered in a DNA databank operated by the police.

Invited to speak prior to his sentence being read out, the man stood in court and said he wanted people to know that, “I miss my children, terribly.”

The man hasn’t seen his daughters, now aged 15 and 12, for more than seven years. The “tension and anxiety” the girls have been exposed to, the judge said, has the younger dealing with such issues as bed-wetting, while both continue to suffer the consequences of their father’s “constant campaign of criminal harassment.”

Assistant Crown attorney Shelley McGuire said after the sentencing that the judge “felt this was worthy of something more serious,” and that it sends a strong message to the community.

“What this woman has been through is horrendous,” said McGuire.

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A judge considering a jail sentence for a Windsor couple convicted of drug charges was asked Wednesday to consider the impact on their children.

Ronald Joseph Pilgrim, 43, and Tammy Lynn Parent, 38, were found guilty of possession of drugs for the purpose of trafficking. Windsor police executed a search warrant on Jan. 28, 2011, seizing 529 Percocet and 179 Oxycodone pills, as well as almost 270 grams of marijuana and eight 100-ml bottles of methadone.

Pilgrim, who has a previous criminal record, was found guilty on the marijuana trafficking charge, while both were convicted on the prescription pill trafficking charges following a Superior Court trial.

Defence lawyers for the two, arguing in part the need to keep the “family unit” together for the sake of the children, now aged 11 and 12, are seeking conditional sentences to be served at home. Both have been free on bail for more than four years with no breaches, they said.

The Crown, pointing to the large quantity of seized drugs, is seeking a three-year prison term for Pilgrim and a three-to-six-month jail sentence for Parent.

“This is a unique case,” assistant Crown attorney Jeff Nanson told Justice Chris Bondy during a sentencing hearing Wednesday. He said the lighter sentence being sought for Parent was in consideration of her position as a mother of two school-aged children.

Defence lawyer Robert DiPietro said Pilgrim suffers from “substance abuse disorder,” and that he has undergone a “considerable amount of surgeries,” the result of which has seen him on pain medications the past seven to eight years. He said his client, who lives on a disability pension, had a “difficult upbringing” but that he’s dealing with his drug issues. “He’s certainly not the same person today as the person who was arrested in 2011.”

Parent’s lawyer, Rae-Anne Copat, said her client has no criminal record or drug addiction issues but that she has been unable to work following a motor vehicle accident in 2008. She is “solely reliant on Mr. Pilgrim” and wants to be supportive of her partner, she added.

DiPietro disputed the Crown’s contention that Pilgrim was operating an illicit “commercial venture” in a home with children present.

Justice Bondy will announce his decision July 6.

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The mother of a young child arrested in a million-dollar grow house bust in Lakeshore was simply a low-level worker in the drug operation, but she’s now the one left holding the bag — and facing jail.

While filling a function within the hierarchy of the drug operation, Cai Yan Chen, 36, was “the gardener, not the mastermind or person who primarily benefited financially,” assistant Crown attorney Ed Posliff told an Ontario Superior Court judge Wednesday.

While “insulating the mastermind from detection,” such low-level workers nevertheless play an important role in “facilitating large-scale grow ops at the commercial level,” Posliff told Justice Gregory Verbeem.

The OPP executed a drug search warrant on a home at 138 Seymour Cres. in Lakeshore on Feb. 29, 2012. They discovered 1,500 marijuana plants with a street value of $1 million. Police made two arrests, but charges against an older male were withdrawn after Chen took responsibility, said Posliff. No one else involved in the case is charged.

At a sentencing hearing Wednesday, the prosecution said Chen should serve a jail sentence of 15 to 18 months, as well as be ordered to pay $50,000 in compensation to Hydro One for electricity stolen via an illegal bypass used to power the operation.

While having made a “disastrous decision,” defence lawyer James Frost argued his client, a first-time offender with a six-year-old daughter, supports her family and should be allowed to serve a conditional sentence in the range of two years less a day.

“Ms. Chen is bearing the brunt of other people’s criminality,” said Frost, adding that Chen made no money from her involvement in the large-scale local grow op. He said she’ll be making payments “for many, many years” to Ontario Hydro, which has also launched separate civil court proceedings against Chen to recover approximately $72,000.

“That’s what happens when you get involved in these types of activities,” said Posliff.

While pleading guilty to her role, he said it came “fairly late” in the judicial process and that she had not assisted the investigation. The owner of the home — valued by the prosecution at $400,000 — was “not co-operative,” he added.

The Chinese-born Chen, a resident of the Toronto area who required a Cantonese interpreter at the sentencing hearing, indicated through her lawyer that jail would prevent her from helping in the day-to-day requirements of her daughter. The judge, however, said he was troubled by the fact Chen left her daughter behind in Vancouver in order to travel to Ontario to assist in the marijuana grow op.

“It wasn’t just a mistake, it was a disastrous decision,” said Frost.

Posliff pointed out that, under recently enacted tougher federal legislation, the new mandatory minimum sentence on a marijuana production conviction is two years in jail.

The judge will announce his decision in September.

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There are few better defences than having someone climb into the witness stand mid-trial and swear under oath that he’s the guy who torched the victim’s house and not the accused sitting in the docket.

But can you believe the word of a man who boasts 89 prior criminal convictions?

“He’s had a lifetime of blatant disregard for the law, and now we should believe him?” assistant Crown attorney George Spartinos said of Daniel Sauve.

Sauve was testifying for the defence in the arson, mischief and assault trial of fellow Leamington man Jay David Shanks, 55, who is accused of using graffiti and arson to exact revenge on the alleged thief of his marijuana plants and then using violence to keep a witness from squealing.

“You shouldn’t believe a word that comes out of his mouth,” Spartinos told Superior Court Justice George King during the trial’s closing arguments Thursday. He said Sauve’s version of events was “bordering on the absurd.”

But the Crown didn’t fare much better with the calibre of its own witnesses.

When defence lawyer Ken Marley began, in his closing arguments, to question the credibility of one prosecution witness, the judge cut him off. King said the witness, Alfred Kettle of Leamington, “appeared to be in a very intoxicated state” during his courtroom appearance and that “I’m inclined to disbelieve” his testimony.

King ended this week’s trial by describing the “trying circumstances” surrounding the courtroom appearances of at least three of the witnesses. It was, “at a minimum, entertaining,” he added.

The judge will announce his decision on Aug. 20.

The defence argued that the prosecution’s case hinged on the testimony of a single witness, but that that person admitted to being an alcoholic and was drinking on the occasions of the alleged events. Marley said Richard Larocque, friends with both the accused and the victim, was “confused” about graffiti sprayed on the victim’s house, and his testimony on the timing of it was at odds with a police witness.

Marley also questioned the believability of “people living that type of lifestyle.” Larocque testified he drank with Shanks, who was also a source of marijuana for him.

While perhaps not the best of prosecution witnesses, Spartinos said it was Larocque himself who confessed he was an alcoholic, and he divulged he had a criminal record. Under cross-examination by the defence, Larocque had to admit his criminal record was longer than what he had first divulged.

“There’s no other evidence linking Mr. Shanks to these events,” Marley said, including any corroborating witnesses or forensic evidence.

A dispute between Shanks and his Leamington neighbour over the alleged theft of marijuana plants escalated from threats to mischief and then arson on July 8, 2013, the trial heard. Larocque testified he didn’t talk to police and point the finger at Shanks until he himself became an alleged target of the violence. He told the trial he witnessed the graffiti spraying, as well as Shanks’s threats and preparations for the arson attack.

Shanks has been in custody since last July. Prior to the most recent events, he was found guilty of smashing his neighbour’s window, and he’ll be back on trial in September on marijuana production charges.

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Jarrod Rusnak, the man accused in connection with a fatal LaSalle hit and run, was released on bail Friday.

Rusnak, 38, was arrested and charged by police five days after Kevin Emisch — known as the “Bushman” — was struck by a vehicle and left to die in the 800 block of Huron Street.

Rusnak appeared in the Ontario Court of Justice Friday for the second day of his bail hearing. He was released on $5,000 bail, with the condition that he live at his sister’s or father’s home and stay in Ontario.

He is not permitted to associate with any witnesses involved in the case, nor to return to the site of the collision. He also must stay inside between midnight and 6 a.m., unless he has to go to work.

“My client is happy to be out, and we’ll take it one step at a time,” said defence lawyer Robert Dipietro. “For a person with no record, he’s been in custody for three, four or five days. It hasn’t been a pleasant experience to say the least.”

Emisch, also 38, was struck by an SUV around 9:45 p.m. on June 18. Emergency crews found the cyclist lying on the street with no vital signs. He was pronounced dead at hospital.

A neighbour told the Star that Emish was lying on the street near the curb. His bicycle was about 30 feet away.

Police released surveillance footage of the suspect vehicle in a bid to identify the driver.

Rusnak has been charged with failing to remain at the scene.

Dipietro said it was difficult to comment on the Crown’s case, since much of the evidence has not returned from being assessed.

He said he felt it was the right decision to release Rusnak.

“He has no record. He has no pending charges. He’s entitled to reasonable bail,” Dipietro said.

Police say the investigation is continuing.

Rusnak will return to court July 23.

ctthompson@windsorstar.com

Jarrod Rusnak, the man accused in a fatal LaSalle hit and run, leaves Ontario Court after being released on bail on June 26, 2015. (Dan Janisse/The Windsor Star)

A 31-year-old children’s gymnastics coach accused of grooming and kidnapping a 12-year-old and facing new charges in relation to another victim was released on bail Friday.

Carson Miles Dickie appeared in the Ontario Court of Justice Friday afternoon. He is facing nine charges, including luring and abduction, in relation to two people.

Dickie’s defence attorney Andrew Bradie confirmed that new charges have been laid in relation to another victim, but would not confirm the age of that person.

“As I understand it, the police had certain information, they followed up on it and contacted the person from a number of years ago and charges were laid arising from that,” he said.

Police told The Star the man arrested had been cultivating a relationship with a 12-year-old Amherstburg girl since January.

Out on bail, Carson Miles Dickie, right, leaves Ontario Court of Justice Friday June 26, 2015. Dickie, 31, has nine charges against him, including luring and abduction. (NICK BRANCACCIO/The Windsor Star).

Investigators are keeping tight-lipped about how the two met, saying they don’t want to release any information that could identify the girl.

Dickie was released into the custody of his parents. He’ll be expected to live at his father and step-mother’s home, remaining indoors between midnight and 6 a.m., unless he is required to leave for work.

He was released on $10,000 bail, which the Justice acknowledged is higher than usual because of the age of the alleged victims.

Dickie will be restricted from interacting with anyone younger than 16, and is not allowed to go to a public park, swimming area, day-care or school grounds unless he is accompanied by one of his parents. He is also not allowed to have any contact with witnesses in connection with the case, nor with the alleged victims.

His father is also expected to monitor his cellphone and Internet use.

Amherstburg police said the accused had been communicating with the young girl in person and through text messages for the past several months. On several occasions, police said, he picked the girl up at her school without her parents knowing.

Officers arrested the man around 4 a.m. on June 12, after the girl’s parents reported she went missing. Police stopped him in Amherstburg and arrested him near where the girl was allegedly waiting for him to pick her up.

Bradie said Dickie endured difficult conditions in the cramped South West Detention Centre.

“For someone who has been leading an otherwise exemplary life and is presumed innocent, any period of incarceration is difficult. But he survived it and we’ll see where we go,” Bradie said.

Dickie will be back in court July 28.

ctthompson@windsorstar.com

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Scott Quick, accused of killing his estranged wife Nancy Galbraith-Quick, will remain in custody until mid-July when he will find out whether he has been granted bail.

Quick appeared briefly in Superior Court Friday morning.

Superior Court Justice George King said due to illness in his family, he was unable to give his decision.

Quick’s bail hearing has been rescheduled for July 22, when Justice King said he expects to have a decision prepared.

The 48-year-old Quick is facing a first-degree murder charge in connection with his wife’s death.

Quick allegedly ran down his estranged wife around 8:40 a.m. Feb. 23, 2006, as she was heading into work at St. William elementary school in Emeryville.

Police arrested Quick, 48, on March 11, 2015, at a business in Belleville, where he was living.

ctthompson@windsorstar.com

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Windsor police Const. Kent Rice is back to being convicted of assaulting a young man in a public housing stairwell, following last week’s Ontario Court of Appeal decision.

One year ago, a Superior Court judge overturned the officer’s original 2013 conviction for using excessive force in arresting Gladson Chinyangwa back in 2012 — an incident caught on a video that surfaced months later.

Rice, who had been suspended with pay, went back to work almost immediately after the overturn, though in an administrative role.

But the Crown appealed that decision and last week the appeals court concluded that “we disagree with the appeal judge.” The judge in the original trial properly assessed all the circumstances surrounding the use of force, the appeals court said.

“Included in this assessment was whether or not the suspect was acting aggressively. The video evidence strongly supports, among other things, the trial judge’s finding that the suspect was not.”

When Rice was originally on trial, court heard that police were responding in February 2012 to a reported fight at a public housing building on McDougall Avenue when Chinyangwa called them “pigs.” Rice pushed Chinyangwa — who was drunk and had been smoking marijuana — into the stairwell, where Chinyangwa fell to the floor. Rice testified that when Chinyangwa began “hoarking” as if preparing to spit, he hit the young black man in the face. The officer ordered Chinyangwa to get up, and when he stayed down, he kicked him twice.

Chinyangwa was not charged and didn’t make a complaint about how he was treated until after police tracked him down after the video became public.

The original trial judge, Justice Donald Downie, decided the first hit with the hand was not excessive force but the two kicks were unnecessary and excessive. In the original appeal, Superior Court Justice Thomas Heeney concluded there had been an error in principle and in law and decided that the kicking wasn’t excessive force. He set aside Rice’s conviction and acquitted him.

The appeals court last week concluded that Downie was correct when he took the suspect’s lack of aggression into account. There was “no basis to interfere with the trial judge’s decision,” the court ruled.

The appeals court did agree that Rice’s original punishment — a conditional sentence with probation — should be reduced to a conditional discharge. A conditional discharge really amounts to a non-conviction as long as he lives up to the terms of his probation, so it improves Rice’s chances of keeping his job.

“It really is much less of a sentence than originally, much less,” Windsor police Chief Al Frederick said Monday.

The chief said the next step now is to hold a Police Act hearing into Rice’s use of force.

“I can’t mete out any type of penalty under the Police Services Act until he undergoes a hearing under the Police Act,” Frederick said, declining to comment on whether the officer should be fired.

“The matter is hearing all the facts and applying the appropriate penalty pursuant to all the controls in the Act and in relation to all other similar Act convictions in the Province of Ontario,” he said. “So there’s a long road yet.”

He said he would try to expedite the start of the hearing.

The chief has not decided on whether to suspend Rice in the meantime. He said he first needs to read the Court of Appeal decision and wait for Rice’s 30-day appeal window.

Rice’s lawyer in the appeal could not be reached Monday, nor could a representative of Rice’s union, the Windsor Police Association.

bcross@windsorstar.com

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An Amherstburg woman told a Superior Court judge Tuesday she found “nothing unusual” about a pair of strangers ringing her doorbell just after 5 a.m. on Nov. 14, 2012.

The two men said their car had become stuck and they needed a tow, she said, adding they couldn’t describe where the black BMW was.

Before a tow truck came to their rescue, however, Amherstburg police were on the scene, and within short order the two were under arrest. On the back seat of the car — 10.1 kilograms of marijuana.

Leading to the car in the ditch were fresh tire tracks across a frosty field. Following the tracks that ended at a horse barn at 8566 Conc. Rd. 8 in Amherstburg, police discovered another 212.4 kg of pot, yielding one of the largest local narcotics seizures ever — a $2.1-million drug bust.

One of the men that morning, Edward Seery, of Toronto, pleaded guilty just a week later on two counts of possession for the purpose of trafficking. He was eventually sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison.

This week, the trial continues for the other man nabbed that morning, Benjamin Herta, who turns 28 on July 8, and Tiffany Natywary, 40, owner of the 30-acre property that housed the pot-filled barn. Both are charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking.

Almost three years after the arrests of seven people, Justice Thomas Carey this week dismissed Charter of Rights applications put forward by the defence for Herta and Natywary to have the criminal charges dismissed over the methods police used to discover and seize the massive volume of harvested pot.

Police officers with Windsor’s DIGS unit testified Tuesday that additional marijuana (226 grams), along with a digital scale, cash ($2,800 in $20 bills under a mattress) and “debt lists” were seized in a subsequent search of Herta’s home in the 1500 block of Lincoln Road.

Retired autoworker and businessman Donald Gauthier, who helped Natywary acquire 8566 Conc. Rd. 8 by taking out the mortgage on the property, testified Tuesday that the only time he knew of someone else wanting to use the property was when he was introduced to a man named “Joe” who passed along $1,000 cash in an envelope. Instructing him in the fall of 2012 to pass along the payment to Natywary’s father, Gauthier said he understood it was for use of the property for hunting.

“For $1,000, what did that entitle him to do?” asked federal prosecutor Richard Pollock.

“I don’t know, he never told me,” Gauthier replied.

He told the court the entire property is now subject to a federal proceeds-of-crime seizure application. Herta’s BMW, registered to his father, and the seized cash are also part of that application.

“I didn’t do anything,” said Gauthier. Asked by Pollock whether he knew why the property for which he holds the mortgage was under such an order — which remains on hold pending the trial’s outcome — Gauthier said local police wouldn’t tell him.

Gauthier said he had spoken several times to Natywary and her father since the big drug bust but that he couldn’t recall whether he’d ever mentioned “Joe” to either of them. He also said Tuesday he still has the $1,000.

The trial continues Thursday with Gauthier still on the stand, under questioning by the prosecution.

dschmidt@windsorstar.com

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A sentencing judge won’t be able to assess whether a Windsor man was temporarily insane when he snuck up from behind on a teenager and started savagely striking his head with a hammer.

To make that determination, a psychiatric assessment of Rafid Jihad, 32, is required, but Superior Court Justice Scott Campbell heard Tuesday that Jihad has refused to co-operate.

Assistant Crown attorney Eric Costaris told the court that Jihad can’t be compelled to co-operate with any such medical assessment against his will.

Campbell ruled May 11 that Jihad was guilty of attempted murder for the June 6, 2014, attack that left Jacob Mitchell, 13, with a fractured skull. Jihad’s “specific intent (was) to kill … (that’s) the only logical conclusion that can be drawn,” Campbell said at the time.

The defence was against any such medical assessment order. Lawyer Frank Retar said if his client were found to be not criminally responsible for his actions that day, he could conceivably spend the rest of his natural life in an institution.

Retar told reporters outside court Tuesday that a typical sentence for attempted murder is between five and seven years, and that the defence will be seeking an even shorter period of incarceration. He said Jihad advised him he “felt uncomfortable participating in any other psychiatric evaluations” after his initial fitness-to-stand-trial assessment.

A sentencing hearing will be held July 23.

Prior to Jihad’s brief court appearance this week, Retar asked the judge if he could escort his client into the courtroom. Dressed in an orange jumpsuit with his hands shackled to a belt around his waist, Jihad was also escorted in by three police officers, two of them tactical squad members.

Asked why his client launched such a savage and seemingly random attack on a child, Retar told reporters that’s a question people can ask Jihad when he’s eventually released. “I haven’t asked him,” Retar said.

Mitchell was walking to the corner store near his Church Street home when Jihad hit him in the head from behind with a claw hammer. The attacker then repeatedly swung at him while he was on the ground before just as suddenly ending the bloody assault and sitting down.

There were a number of witnesses to the brutal attack, and Jihad’s lawyer never contested his role in the assault. It was the prosecution’s task to prove beyond a reasonable doubt he had intended to kill his young victim.

dschmidt@windsorstar.com

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A man alleged to have paid $1,000 cash for permission to hunt on an Amherstburg property was the same man connected to two alleged marijuana-growing operations, a drug trial heard Thursday.

It was at one of those properties, 8566 Conc. Rd. 8, where, a short time later, Amherstburg and Windsor police executed one of the area’s biggest pot busts ever — a $2.1-million drug seizure on Nov. 14, 2002.

Prosecution witness Donald Gauthier testified he only knew the man who handed him the stack of $20 bills as “Joe.” Shown at trial a series of photos prepared for a drug squad briefing on the case, Gauthier pointed to the man he knew as Joe as the one identified on the briefing sheet as Joseph Parum.

Gauthier had been instructed at a subsequent encounter with Joe in the fall of 2012 to forward the cash to the father of Tiffany Natywary, owner of 6566 Conc. Rd. 8. Nearly three years later, Gauthier, who holds the mortgage to the 30-acre property, said he still has the $1,000, and he couldn’t recall Thursday whether he’d ever discussed his encounter with Joe, or the money, to either Natywary or her father.

“A guy gives him $1,000 for hunting, and he doesn’t tell anybody about a suspicious fellow?” federal drug prosecutor Richard Pollock told The Star during a break in the courtroom proceedings.

Tiffany Natywary, 40, and Benjamin Herta, 27, are charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking. Police discovered 212.4 kg of pot at Natywary’s property, while an additional 10.1 kg was discovered on the backseat of Herta’s BMW, which became stuck in a nearby ditch early that morning. Windsor police found more pot and alleged drug debt lists at Herta’s Lincoln Road home in Windsor.

Natywary’s lawyer Robert DiPietro had one of the witnesses in the case, Sgt. Donald Brown of Amherstburg police, describe a grow-op bust two years earlier, on June 10, 2010, in which Parum was one of five males arrested. The men were allegedly preparing a marijuana-growing operation in the middle of an Amherstburg woodlot clearing, where investigators discovered 367 postholes, each with fertilizer at the bottom.

This week’s trial heard that the owner of that property knew nothing of the forest clearing or the alleged activities in the summer of 2010. Gauthier, who could lose his property under a federal proceeds-of-crime seizure application, testified he knew nothing about the pot or others using his property at 8566 Conc. Rd. 8 in 2012.

The trial before Superior Court Justice Thomas Carey continues Friday.

Edward Seery of Toronto pleaded guilty in the case in 2012 to a charge of possession for the purpose of trafficking and was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison.

dschmidt@windsorstar.com

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Windsor parents who hid drugs in their couch cushions and refrigerator within easy reach of their young children were each sentenced to more than a year of jail time Monday by a Superior Court judge.

Ronald Joseph Pilgrim, 43, was sentenced to 20 months in custody less two days for time served, plus 18 months probation. His common-law wife Tammy Lynn Parent, 38, was sentenced to 15 months in jail, plus 18 months probation.

The couple were found guilty of possession of drugs for the purpose of trafficking. Windsor police found 529 Percocet and 179 Oxycodone pills, as well as 270 grams of marijuana and eight 100-millitre bottles of methadone at their home on Jan. 28, 2011.

Superior Court Justice Christopher Bondy told the couple they showed “no insight into the great danger into which your children were placed.”

Some of the Percocet and Oxycodone pills — both strong painkillers — were stored in a plastic bag, rather than the child-proof container required by law, Bondy pointed out. Some were stuffed under couch cushions where the children likely sat to watch TV.

He said the couple dealt drugs from their home, rather than out of a car or somewhere else. A teenager also living in the home was already using marijuana, Bondy noted.

Pilgrim became teary-eyed in court as he apologized for his actions, telling the justice he has struggled with chronic back and neck pain and was prescribed pain medications that he did not know were highly addictive.

“I really feel like I failed my family, and I apologize for that,” he said, choking up. He promised he would stay out of trouble in future.

Parent stood briefly, apologizing to the court through tears.

“I promise I won’t be here again,” she said.

Defence lawyers for the two had argued for conditional sentences to be served at home. Both had been free for about four and a half years on bail with no breaches, they said.

The Crown argued for three years of incarceration for Pilgrim and three to six months in jail for Parent.

Parent hung her head as Bondy read his decision. He said he considered Parent’s history and the fact that she has no criminal record, but found that she did not show any intention of seeking support for her husband’s drug addiction.

He said Pilgrim, who grew up in an abusive household and struggled with chronic pain since he was a teenager, was dealing drugs to feed his addiction.

Pilgrim has a criminal record, including being convicted for sexual assault, but his last conviction was in 1996. Bondy said he took that gap into account.

Bondy also noted it was clear both Pilgrim and Parent broke their bail conditions by admitting to use of marijuana during the four years between their arrest and the sentencing.

ctthompson@windsorstar.com

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