SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - A 56-year-old man charged with sexually assaulting three female children more than 15 years ago will learn his fate today in Supreme Court after a two-day trial concluded Tuesday.

"I haven't been able to make sense how this has come about," said the accused, Randy Gordon Larsen, while testifying on Tuesday. "It's been a situation like having someone commit suicide. You ask yourself 'why' but can never come up with an answer."

After hearing closing arguments from Crown prosecutor Marc Lecorre and defence lawyer Tracy Bock, Justice John Vertes adjourned the case until 10 a.m. today to deliver his verdict.

Larsen is accused of sexually assaulting and touching the three girls between Aug. 15, 1989 and Feb. 28, 1994, in Yellowknife.

The first complainant, now 30, gave graphic and harrowing testimony on Monday. She told the court Larsen, a friend of the family, lived in the basement of their downtown home for about two months in 1989 and sexually assaulted her "many times" over the years, starting when she was around eight years old.

"I would pretend I was sleeping when he came in," she said while wiping the tears from her eyes.

When Bock asked her how she knew it was Larsen touching her, she said she kept her eyes open just enough so she could "see him through her eyelids."

Her younger sister, now 26, testified Larsen entered her bedroom one day while the family wasn't home, took her clothes off and sexually assaulted her. On another occasion, when she was eight, she said he touched her inappropriately

while she was in his pickup truck.

Both girls testified they told their mother of the sexual assaults, but each time the mother got mad and said she didn't believe them. However, the mother finally started believing the girls after receiving a phone call from the older sister's high school teacher after the girl wrote an essay describing the sexual assaults. At one point, Lecorre said the mother was scheduled to testify, however, he changed his mind and the woman never took the stand.

A third complainant, now 27, and unrelated to the first two complainants, testified on Monday that Larsen stayed with her family during the same time period and groped her while she was nine years old.

After the Crown closed its case, Vertes said it was unclear why it took so long to bring the charges to court. Lecorre's reply was that the mother of the two children never brought the allegations forward until the complainants were adults.

Larsen, who now lives in Haines Junction, Yukon, took the stand on Tuesday and steadfastly denied all the allegations. Upon hearing his denials, one of the complainants burst

into tears and ran out of the courtroom.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.