A Montrealer who put a pre-teen girl through an ordeal by sexually assaulting her for years was sentenced Thursday to nine years in prison. The judge thus refused to reduce the sentence, simply because the assailant will be deported from Canada, as requested by the defense.
“The Tribunal is of the view that it would be wrong to impose a more lenient sentence on the accused because of the timing of his eligibility for parole before his deportation from Canada. In addition, imposing a sentence of five to six years would be inappropriate, ”concluded Judge Pierre Labrie Thursday at the Montreal courthouse.
Convicted by a jury last month, Miguel Antonio Abarzua Poblete subjected an 11-year-old girl to extremely degrading sexual abuse. The 42-year-old will be deported to Chile for serious criminality at the end of his sentence or upon obtaining his parole.
Defense attorney M.e Marc Labelle asked for a reduced sentence, since in his opinion his client was not eligible for parole and had to spend his entire sentence in detention. Me Labelle even mentioned the cost of “each inmate […] for Canadian society” and the shortage of federal employees.
However, Labrie J. completely rejected this analysis. Studying the law, the judge believes Mr Poblete will in fact be eligible for full parole after serving a third of his sentence. If he obtains it, he will immediately be expelled from Canada. In any case, the courts do not have to take into account the parole to determine the just sentence, according to the judge.
“I do not share this vision. In fact, what we are experiencing is rather what I described: when a person is going to be expelled for serious criminality, they serve their entire sentence. These are the cases we have experienced, ”commented Me Labelle, in a press scrum. However, he intends to assert this judgment with the parole board to demonstrate his client’s eligibility.
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Me Marc Labelle in 2018
Justice Labrie identified a plethora of aggravating factors to warrant a nine-year sentence – the Crown’s suggestion – including significant victim impact, breach of trust, penetrative relationships, victim age and his attempt to have the complaint withdrawn.
The numerous assaults were particularly sordid, including a harrowing episode of anal penetration in a garage. “He said to me: ‘Get up.’ He pushed me towards the table. […] It hurt. I wanted him to stop. He said I was weak. He said: “It’s nothing, you’ll get used to it”, had confided the teenager. Miguel Antonio Abarzua Poblete was also delighted to have taken the “virginity” of the victim at the age of 12.
The victim, now 16, had confided in all her suffering in a hard-hitting letter during sentencing submissions. “I felt guilty, even though I didn’t have to. I felt dirty. All this time I was just a kid being manipulated. […] I would like to remove all these traumatic thoughts from my youth. »
It should be noted that due to the preventive detention, the sentence imposed to date is eight years.
Me Nadine Haviernick represented the Crown.