After beginning in Bracebridge, Ont., last fall, the sex assault trial of Coun. Michaael Thompson shifted to another courthouse on Monday, and while it’s nearing its end, the conclusion is still months away and will happen in yet another municipality.
The Scarborough Centre city councillor was charged with two counts of sexual assault in 2022, following accusations from two woman after a Muskoka cottage weekend. Thompson has maintained his innocence and denied several of the allegations testifying in his own defence.
The trial has been drawn out over several months over scheduling issues faced by the judge, the Crown, and the defence. After shifting to Barrie in the spring, it continued on Monday in Bradford where closing submissions were heard.
Thompson’s lawyer, Leora Shemesh, accused all three witnesses who testified on behalf of the Crown as lacking in credibility. They were accused of crafting a fraudulent tale and their attempts to besmirch her client’s reputation were nothing more than a witch hunt, Shemesh said.
All three of the women were guests of Thompson’s and are protected by a publication ban preventing their identity. Two of the women are complainants in the trial, one alleging Thompson fondled her breasts and buttocks under her bathing suit while applying sunscreen. Another woman told the court Thompson forced oral sex on her and ejaculated on her.
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Thompson has denied both of these accounts and said he only applied sunscreen to one of the complainants when he was asked to, while denying the allegation of improper touching. The councillor also said he engaged in a consensual sex act with the other woman, offering a counter-narrative that she had woken him up and performed oral sex on him.
On Monday, Shemesh said the witness alleging her client had forced himself on her was not credible, urging Judge Philop Brissette to disregard her evidence. Shemesh said while there were different narratives offered, she said Crown Attorney Marieke Newhouse failed to meet the bar of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
Newhouse countered during her own closing arguments that it was Thompson who was presenting a false narrative about the events of the long weekend. The Crown argued that the councillor had been plying the women with alcohol and marijuana throughout the weekend, accusing Thompson of lying when he testified that none of the guests were intoxicated throughout the weekend.
The Crown also accused Thompson of repeatedly offering unsolicited stories of being charitable, not in an attempt to clear his name, but as a performative attempt to appear as a benevolent civic leader for an audience outside the courtroom. Newhouse also said Thompson’s assertion that the sex acts were consensual were fictitious and that he forced himself on one of the complainants when she had repeatedly said “no.”
At the end of the day Justice Brissette told both lawyers that he is considering several verdicts to ongoing trials and would not be able to render a decision until September. At that news, Thompson could audibly be heard sighing heavily, before both lawyers agreed to hear a decision on Sept. 16 in Midland.
Outside the courthouse, the councillor ignored reporters’ questions, but his lawyer Shemesh said she is content with how the trial had progressed.
“I think it went how it should,” Shemesh said “I’m very happy with how things have gone and now it’s in the judge’s hands.”
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