Warning: This story discusses sexual violence that may be triggering for some readers.
Irvine Charleyboy was acquitted on Nov. 7 of all historic sexual abuse charges following a trial in B.C. Supreme Court.
Charleyboy, a former chief of Tsideldel, walked out of the courtroom with charges dismissed while the Crown’s witness was comforted by supporters.
Charleyboy had been on trial in Williams Lake all week, charged with indecent assault and acts of gross indecency , which had been alleged to have taken place between 1974 and 1980.
Madame Justice Marguerite Church read out the charges and reiterated the undisputed background facts which established a connection between the accused and the Crown’s sole witness in the trial and a timeline of their association.
The complainant made a statement to RCMP in 2018 regarding the allegations of sexual abuse. She was a minor at the time.
The alleged incidents included that Charleyboy had touched her genitals and breasts, made threats of sexual violence and exposed himself to her.
Church noted Charleyboy is now 80 years of age, his admission of historic binge-drinking, his having become sober in 1990 and his ongoing denial of the allegations.
“This trial involves allegations of sexual offences and the central issue in this case is the credibility and the reliability of the complainant,” said Church.
In her decision, which took more than 30 minutes to read to the court and public audience, Church went over the “heavy burden” on the Crown prosecutor to prove the charges “beyond a reasonable doubt” and the evidence must be considered in the context of all of the evidence.
She noted the court must not fall prey to rape myth stereotypes around the expectations of the behaviour of victims of sexual offences.
Church also acknowledged that when considering testimony involving experiences from childhood, children view the world differently than adults and may not recall details around location, frequency and time the same way an adult would.
She said on the whole, she found the witness to be “sincere and forthright,” calling her “candid” and “fair” as well.
Despite these acknowledgements, in her decision, Church said the witness having brought forward additional evidence not previously mentioned in her 2018 statement to police raised some questions for the judge around the witness’ reliability.
She said while she found the witness to “be doing her best to be truthful,” she found some of the evidence to be “implausible.”
One instance she questioned was testimony by the witness that Charleyboy pulled the complainant’s hips from behind into contact with his groin area, which Church found implausible because the witness did not specify Charleyboy crouched down to do so, despite her being much shorter, as a young child, and he being over six feet tall.
Church dismissed some of the Crown’s assertions around the reliability of Charleyboy’s evidence, including his denials that he had any opportunity to perpetrate the alleged abuse due to his lack of contact with the witness.
Instead, she said, “his evidence is not wholly unbelievable.”
Church said she did “not necessarily believe all of Mr. Charleyboy’s testimony” and “found (the witness) to be a sincere witness,” but had reservations around the reliability of some of the witness’ testimony.
Church said she was left “not knowing whom to believe or what to believe with respect to the allegations. In those circumstances, the Crown has failed to discharge its burden and establish the allegations in the indictment beyond a reasonable doubt.”