A man accused of sexually assaulting a girlfriend has successfully pleaded an unusual defense of sexual sleepwalking. But Yannick Giguère was not acquitted: on Tuesday, the judge rather rendered a verdict declaring him not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder. He will now have to appear before the Mental Disorder Review Board which will decide his fate.
At trial, the 46-year-old accused did not deny the alleged acts, but claimed to remember nothing.
And then, with psychiatric and neurological expertise in support, he claimed to suffer from sexsomnia, a form of somnambulism manifested by episodes during which he involuntarily performs sexual acts in his sleep, without realizing what is happening.
He therefore asked to be acquitted.
One evening in July 2018, the victim had gone to sleep at the accused’s with a friend, after a drunken evening. She testified that he offered to sleep in the living room or in his bed. She chose the latter option. Except that she woke up in the middle of the night, Yannick Giguère above her, who rubbed her crotch. She says she froze, was afraid of his reaction, and closed her eyes. Then the man entered her mechanically, without words or caresses. She filed a complaint the next morning.
The Crown prosecutor, Mr.e Bruno Ménard, had demanded a conviction. Yannick Giguère is not credible, and was intoxicated that night, which is not an excuse in cases of sexual assault, he pleaded.
By reading his judgment in a courtroom of the Montreal courthouse for an hour and a half, Judge André Perreault of the Court of Quebec first decided this: it is clear to him that the complainant was the victim of a sexual assault.
He also recalled that the courts have in the past accepted sexsomnia defenses, a form of automatism.
Thus, to avoid a conviction, Yannick Giguère had to convince the judge of the “involuntary” nature of his actions.
The magistrate pondered the matter for a long time. On the basis of the expert reports that he considered credible as well as testimonies – in particular that of an ex-spouse of Yannick Giguère who related at the trial that he performed sexual acts in full sleep on several occasions when they were as a couple — the judge made this conclusion:
“The evidence clearly establishes that at the time (July 2018) he was suffering from sexsomnia. »
However, it is a mental disorder, underlines the magistrate. He therefore declared the man not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder: a verdict which is not an acquittal, nor a conviction.
However, Judge Perreault declared that he had “public order” concerns, because the accused represents a risk for the population. He has had several episodes of sexsomnia in the past and clearly “his efforts are not enough” to prevent them.
Thus, his case was referred to the Mental Disorders Review Board, which will have several options: keep him in a psychiatric establishment, release him, or even release him with conditions, for example, imposing the taking of medication.
In addition, given the nature of the acts committed, the magistrate ordered that Mr. Giguère be placed on the sex offenders register for 20 years.
In the courtroom, the plaintiff, Andréanne Slythe, listened to the magistrate read his judgment, without flinching. The woman can now be identified as she asked the judge to lift the publication ban on her name.
In front of the journalists, in a corridor of the palace, she declared herself satisfied with the result.
“He doesn’t get away with it with a slap on the wrist. There are consequences to that. I believe that justice has been done. And I’m happy to turn the page.
She feared that this defense of sexsomnia would be used to all winds by aggressors.
Anticipating this, the judge cautioned in his very detailed decision: “The court wishes to emphasize that a potential assailant would be ill-advised to commit a sexual assault hoping, on the basis of the present case, to be able to not to be found guilty by inventing a sexsomnia. Others have already tried, without success, he said: “They were doomed. »
Me Ménard agreed: it’s a rare, complex defense with many conditions to fulfill. “It is not a magic formula for an accused. »