Bobby Zoe guilty in home invasion
Application will be made to put him on dangerous offenders list, says Crown prosecutor
Evan Kiyoshi French
Northern News Services
Friday, February 26, 2016
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A judge has found 35-year-old Bobby Zoe guilty of a downtown home invasion and sexual assault last year, a conviction that may place the repeat sex offender on the dangerous offenders list.
Bobby Zoe, seen here being led out of territorial court on Monday, has been found guilty of a home invasion and sexual assault at a downtown apartment last year. A Crown prosecutor told court Monday she is seeking to have him designated a dangerous offender. - NNSL file photo |
The Feb. 15, 2015 crime led to an RCMP review of its communications policies after it was revealed police had responded to a similar incident two weeks prior but did not alert the public until after the second home invasion.
Zoe was charged in both cases although charges were later stayed in the first incident.
Court heard during Zoe's trial by judge for the Feb. 15 home invasion, which began in November and resumed Monday, that Zoe had sneaked into an apartment bedroom and began touching the female victim as she slept in her bed with her partner asleep beside her. The man awoke to her screams and chased Zoe out of the apartment and into a stairwell where the two men struggled before the intruder escaped with some cash taken from the apartment.
Zoe's backpack came loose during the fight and the man turned it over to police. The ownership of the backpack, which contained bottles of alcohol and all of Zoe's "worldly possessions," was never in dispute but Zoe testified he was never in the apartment and that it had to be someone else who had stolen it earlier from his hiding place at Fritz Theil Park.
During closing statements Wednesday, Crown prosecutor Jeannie Scott reminded territorial court judge RJ McIntosh that the victim's partner positively identified Zoe as the intruder.
"He said he was 100 per cent positive that was the man he had struggled with," she said.
In finding Zoe guilty Wednesday, territorial court RJ McIntosh said Zoe's testimony during trial lacked credibility and consistency.
"The alibi ... was not consistent with the testimony," said McIntosh, noting Zoe never did go to any bars that evening.
The offender had claimed during the trial that he had stashed his backpack at Fritz Theil Park with the booze inside so he could go to some drinking establishments.
Zoe has at least three other sexual assault-related convictions on his criminal record, including a brutal attack on a stranger he found walking alone on 53 Street.
Scott told the court an application has been made application for a psychiatric assessment to be carried out prior to sentencing.
She said the Crown will also apply to have Zoe added to a dangerous offenders list but that and sentencing will have to wait 60 days for the assessment to be completed.
Zoe remains in custody while awaiting his sentence.
