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LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON
A Fort Liard man who is already serving time for a sexual assault was sentenced to three more years during a Supreme Court trial in Fort Simpson for a second sexual assault.

After a few hours of deliberation on April 4, a 12-person jury returned with a guilty verdict for Paul Payou, 60. The sexual assault charge stemmed from an incident that happened between Feb. 6 and 7, 2011 in Fort Liard. The extent of the victim's intoxication and whether or not she could or did consent to sexual activity were two key factors in the trial.

The jury heard how the victim, a Fort Liard woman younger than Payou, had started to drink early in the day on Feb. 6 at two different residences in the hamlet. Later that evening she rode in Payou's vehicle as he took one of his daughters to the health centre.

While waiting outside the health centre the victim had several more drinks of hard alcohol. Payou then offered to take the victim to his home where he made her a mixed vodka drink and also gave her three vodka shooters.

The victim testified she doesn't remember anything else from that point on until she woke up on Feb. 7 and found herself on a bed in Payou's living room with her pants partially lowered and Payou sitting beside her. During the sentencing, Justice Ted Richard noted the victim's first remarks upon waking were, "What the hell's going on?" to which Payou responded, "Nothing, you just passed out. That's all."

A sexual assault kit taken later that day revealed that Payou had had sex with the victim. Payou admitted to having sex but said it was consensual and that he and the victim were in love at the time.

During his closing statements, Payou's lawyer, Tom Boyd, had asked the jury to find that Payou and the victim had consensual sex and that the victim now doesn't want to take responsibility for her actions. Crown prosecutor Danielle Vaillancourt argued that Payou supplied the victim with alcohol, despite the fact he doesn't drink himself, to get her intoxicated and that as a result the victim was incapable of consenting.

After the jury returned a guilty verdict, Richard said that he was satisfied that Payou had given alcohol to an already intoxicated woman so he could have sex with her.

"Regrettably we have had many, many, many similar cases come before the court in this jurisdiction for years," said Richard, referring to cases where women who are sleeping or passed out are sexually assaulted.

"The prevalence of this type of offence in the communities in this jurisdiction is appalling."

Richard categorized this incident as a "very serious crime of violence."

"His moral blameworthiness is high," he said. "I detect no remorse on the offender's part."

Richard sentenced Payou to three years in prison, a mandatory firearms prohibition order for 10 years, a mandatory order for a DNA sample and to comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act for life.

In deciding the sentence, Richard said he took a number of factors into account including the fact that in February 2011, when the incident took place, Payou was already undergoing court proceedings for an earlier sexual assault charge that related to an incident from November 2009. Payou was sentenced to three years in relation to that case, and has just served the first year of that sentence.

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