HOME LEGAL LINKS SPONSORS CONTACT LEGAL RESOURCES
ONTARIO. PROVINCIAL COURT JUDGES
The Honourable Mr. Justice Gary V. Palmer
Justice Gary V. Palmer recently testified on behalf of Justice Kerry P. Evans who is subject to a number of allegations of "sexual misconduct" by 9 women.
20040814 Woman tells of courthouse sex encounter - Judge's accuser describes thong underwear, oral sex - Defence mentions medication, shaved pubic area, rash "Evans is "a predator," -
Woman tells of courthouse sex encounter
If you have any information about Justice Kerry P. Evans please Email OttawaMensCentre@hotmail.com or call 613-482-11121
Judge's accuser describes thong underwear, oral sex
Defence mentions medication, shaved pubic area, rash
TRACEY TYLER
LEGAL AFFAIRS REPORTER
Aug. 14, 2004. 07:15 AM
A court employee says an Ontario judge manoeuvred her into the bathroom off his judicial chambers, where he performed "oral sex on me" and "I performed oral sex on him.""Somehow I ended up against the bathroom door. I was wearing thong underwear and a purple suit," the woman told an Ontario Judicial Council inquiry. "I kept saying I was going to lose my job."
In dramatic testimony before the inquiry ended yesterday, the woman said Mr. Justice Kerry Evans, 54, suggested she join him in a hotel room and tell her supervisor she was sick. He even offered her money to buy lingerie, she said.
When she told him "there's no way I'm going to leave the premises," the woman said, she and Evans ended up in the bathroom of his chambers at the Barrie courthouse, where "I allowed him to take my underwear off and perform oral sex on me."
"I believe he said, `I pleased you, now it's your turn.' He leaned against the door and I performed oral sex on him," she told a four-member panel. The panel is examining whether Evans is guilty of sexual misconduct and has the power to recommend he be removed from the bench.
"And did you want this to happen?" asked inquiry counsel Doug Hunt.
"No. I didn't want to be having sex with a married old man in his chambers, at my place of employment," she said. "I didn't want to be having sex at work with anybody.
"I didn't think I had the choice to say no."
Evans is "a predator," she said.
"There are two sides to him. This kind and wonderful self, where he helps everyone around him. Then this other self, which he should seek help for."
The woman said she had four intimate encounters with Evans in his office. The incident involving oral sex took place in late August or early September, 2002, she told the panel, headed by Madam Justice Louise Charron of the Ontario Court of Appeal.
But in an equally dramatic defence, Evans not only vehemently denied the allegations but presented the panel with three recent colour photographs of his genitalia.
If oral sex truly took place, the woman would have certainly noticed something "unusual" about Evans' genital area, his lawyer, Brian Greenspan, suggested.
Evans told the inquiry that he has been regularly shaving himself "above the penis and where the pubic hair would be" since 2001.
"Do you shave your scrotum as well?" asked Hunt.
"Yes," Evans replied, adding he's also been on medication which has left him with "difficulty getting an erection."
"Do you remember seeing any body hair?" Greenspan asked the woman in cross-examination.
"I don't remember," she replied. "All I know is he had a big bottom he wanted grabbed."
Evans was wearing "big white jockey shorts underwear," the woman added.
But Evans told the inquiry he wore boxer shorts because he had a rash on his inner right thigh.
His friend, Paul Regan, a Barrie high school vice-principal, testified that he also saw the rash — as well as Evans' shaved pubic area — when they went swimming in July, 2002, and on a trip to Notre Dame University the following September.
Other judges also testified in support of Evans.
While the woman told the inquiry that Evans' office door was always closed, Mr. Justice Glenn Krelove testified it "was always open." Krelove said he frequently walked in to reheat coffee in a microwave, even if Evans was conducting a pretrial hearing with lawyers.
His bathroom was also "terribly cluttered, as is mine," said Mr. Justice Gary Palmer. Greenspan filed photographs of the bathroom, which showed a box of court files under the sink and a cluster of pictures on the floor, including a framed print of the original six NHL arenas.
Medication left him with `difficulty getting an erection'Judge Kerry Evans
The woman is one of eight to lodge complaints against Evans, who was appointed to the Ontario Court of Justice in October, 1997 and has been suspended with pay since December, 2002.
The other complainants have alleged that Evans kissed them, force-fed them candies or touched their buttocks and groin. In most cases, their allegations amount to criminal misconduct and Evans can only be found guilty if the panel finds their testimony "clear and convincing," Greenspan said.
Evans has admitted some incidents but denied others. Touching a court employee's groin area over her gown was "an unfortunate accident," Greenspan said yesterday. But other allegations, if true, would amount to not only recklessness but "professional suicide" on Evans' part, he said.
But Hunt argued the women gave straightforward, believable testimony in contrast to Evans' "carefully crafted ... almost to the point of being scripted" responses. Unlike the complainants, Evans has been a crown attorney, defence lawyer and judge with experience in assessing evidence, he said.
In many of his answers, Evans admitted enough misconduct to make himself sound credible, Hunt argued.
One "important" aspect of Evans' testimony, which the panel will have to "examine closely," involves the issue of his pubic area being shaved, he said.
"When you look at the story, it begins to unravel," he contended.
Evans told the panel his pubic area was initially shaved in 1991 by an orderly at Royal Victoria Hospital in Barrie when he was undergoing a procedure to remove kidney stones. Since then, he has had 14 similar procedures and has been shaved three times.
In 2001, he said, he decided he was going to keep the area shaved, to prevent the discomfort of having hairs grow back in. It wasn't "in anticipation" of needing to have a kidney stone removed, he added.
"I don't know anything about this. But it would seem to me you're in more discomfort when you shave this area to prevent the itching than you would be if you just let your pubic hair grow back in," said Hunt. "I'm sorry sir. I'm just telling you what I do and when I do it," Evans said.
"I appreciate this is embarrassing and difficult. But you raised it ... as an issue ... so I do feel an obligation to explore it," Hunt continued. The complainant, he suggested, might not be able to see the shaved portion "if you had an erection and were wearing a shirt that hung down."
"No sir, I don't think I've ever worn a shirt that goes down so far."
The woman initially told police the encounters took place in August, scattered over various days. But Evans filed his calendar, showing he presided in Barrie just three days at the beginning of the month and two days later.
The first of the four office encounters, the woman said, took place after she said she was thirsty and Evans told her to get a drink from the bar fridge in his closet.
"I was shutting the door and coming up and he was in there with me. He started caressing my shoulders and my right breast," she testified. "I was shocked. I just remember having to get out of there."
But Greenspan noted that when she told her story to the Ontario Provincial Police in 2003 she claimed Evans sent her to fetch him a drink and was much less certain about him grabbing her breast.
"I was ashamed to even say the word `breast' at that time," she explained.
The second incident happened in August, 2002, when she was sitting in front of Evans' computer and "I allowed him to play with my vagina," she said. "I said `You have a wife, you have children.'
He had no fear of anyone walking through that door. Because people knew you didn't walk into Justice Evans' office. You knocked first."
But Mr. Justice Gary Palmer told the inquiry he was always walking into Evans' office and never knocked.
The woman said she didn't want it to happen but doesn't remember if she said anything to Evans at the time. "You didn't get an opportunity to say anything because Justice Evans never shut up. He just talked and talked. Told you how much you were enjoying it. How much you wanted it."
Evans told the inquiry court staff refused to come into his office between April and October because the air conditioning was too cold.
The panel reserved its decision.
20040814 Woman tells of courthouse sex encounter - Judge's accuser describes thong underwear, oral sex - Defence mentions medication, shaved pubic area, rash "Evans is "a predator," - Mr. Justice Kerry P. Evans