SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - A Lutsel K'e resident with a criminal record five pages long has been sentenced to 18 months probation after pleading guilty to assault on May 17.

Ronald Enzoe, who was being held at the North Slave Correctional Centre since the offence took place Feb. 23, won't face any additional jail time.

As part of his probation, Judge Christine Gagnon ordered him to stay sober for nine months, take counselling and not have contact with the woman he assaulted unless he is sober.

In addition, he has to keep his firearms at a separate residence from his own and is only allowed to access them for hunting.

Gagnon said she considered a firearms prohibition, but recognized that hunting is a "necessary means of sustenance" for him and his family.

Enzoe was taken into custody Feb. 23 after a call to the RCMP in Lutsel K'e alerted them of the assault.

When police found him that evening he was reportedly intoxicated, with glossy eyes, slurred speech and was raising his voice.

In a letter to the court, Enzoe, 52, promised he would continue attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings after his release. His lawyer noted he had been attending AA meetings while in jail.

"Mr. Enzoe's aware of his problems with alcohol and he's aware of its effects on his behaviour," his lawyer, Anthony Parr, said in territorial court May 17. "He's been seeking to address his ghosts."

Enzoe has 68 prior convictions, including eight violent crimes, and has been drinking since the age of 10.

His longest period of sobriety was in the 1990s when he quit drinking for two years following an alcohol-induced seizure.

Enzoe said his behaviour stems from abuse while he was a child.

A "residential school survivor" who attended Breynat Hall in Fort Smith and Akaitcho Hall in Yellowknife, he said he was both sexually and physically abused in his youth.

Gagnon said it was up to Enzoe to break the

cycle of violence.

"Collectively we need to denounce violence against women. We need to denounce violence in any form," the judge said.

Enzoe expressed a desire to return home, and said he would work hard to change for his family.

"I can't go on like this," he said. "I'm getting old and I got children to raise and teach them what I know to survive in bush and to work with them each day for the rest of my life."

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