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Repeat sex offender charged again
Man on probation charged in two home invasions; public not warned after first incident

John McFadden
Northern News Services
Wednesday, February 18, 2015

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
A convicted sex offender who had been released early from jail is back in custody, charged with two new counts of sexual assault and breaking and entering.

RCMP did not warn the public or inform the media about a report of a sexual assault and break and enter in downtown Yellowknife on Feb. 1 until yesterday - the day after announcing that Bobby Zoe, 34, had been charged and arrested for another break and enter and sexual assault at a downtown home on Sunday.

RCMP Const. Elenore Sturko stated in an e-mail Monday that the occupants in the second incident had awoken to find a man in their bedroom.

She stated that one of the occupants reported a sexual assault. A theft of items from the residence was also reported, she stated.

According to the news release, RCMP quickly located the suspect nearby. Zoe was also charged with failing to comply with a probation order.

Then late yesterday afternoon, another RCMP news release stated Zoe had been charged with a similar break and enter and sexual assault two weeks earlier in another downtown residence. The suspect was not located at that time, Sturko stated in the news release.

Sturko would not characterize the nature of the sexual assaults, nor would she say whether the victims are female or adults in order to protect their identities. She also would not say whether any of the stolen items were recovered.

Zoe was on probation at the time of his arrest after being sentenced last February to 21 months in jail for breaking into a home in Old Town in October of 2013 while a couple and their two teenaged daughters were sleeping. Neither the Department of Justice nor the RCMP will say when Zoe was released from jail.

The offender was also on probation before his arrest for the Old Town break-in after having again been released early from jail following a brutal sexual assault on a 23-year-old woman - a stranger to Zoe - who was walking alone on 53 Street in January 2011. Her cries alerted a pair of men living in a house nearby who chased after Zoe when they arrived to help. Zoe struck one of them in the head with a wine bottle when they tried to stop him.

Zoe was sentenced to 39 months in prison with time served awaiting trial in April 2012 and released early for good behaviour after serving less than 18 months of his sentence.

Zoe has at least three sexual assault-related convictions on his criminal record.

Prisoners are allowed to be released after having served two-thirds of their sentence providing they are well behaved and participate in corrections programs, according to the NWT Department of Justice.

Offenders are usually given credit for a day and a half for each day they spend in pre-trial custody. That then usually comes off their sentence. Zoe was given 15 months credit for the 13 months he spent in pre-sentence custody for the 2011 crime.

He is currently being held in custody with his next court appearance coming Feb. 17.

Yellowknifer asked Sturko whether RCMP considered releasing a warning to the public when a repeat sex offender is released from prison.

"If there are grounds for a public interest disclosure to be made, then a review of reports is made and if there is a release then it will be made," Sturko said. "If the decision is not to release then we will not even release whether we had the discussion."

Sturko said that process is covered under the federal Privacy Act.

RCMP did release a warning in October for the public to be on the lookout for violent sex offender Travis Casaway, who had returned to Yellowknife after serving a five-year sentence for sexually assaulting two young girls in 2002 when he was 15.

He remains in the city, awaiting a peace bond hearing scheduled for April. Casaway told Yellowknifer last summer that he intends to leave the city once the court proceedings against him have concluded.

During Casaway's latest court appearance last week, Judge Garth Malakoe refused to sign the peace bond because there were no conditions in it restricting Casaway from being in areas where children frequent such as playgrounds and schools.

He noted that the only convictions on Casaway's record involve children and couldn't understand why a peace bond agreement between Susanne Boucher, the Crown prosecutor and Casaway's lawyer Tracy Brock, would not have necessarily protected children.

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