January 8, 2010

 

 

This report  from the Ottawa Sun, (Canada) puts on display the mysterious workings of the judicial mind, or at least the inner workings of Judge Robert Fournier's mind in convicting Tena Tesso, an Ethiopian immigrant in the sexual assault of an attractive 24 year old patient at the Ottawa General hospital emergency room.  Let me quote Megan Gillis' report:

"A judge convicted an orderly of groping an emergency room patient’s breast, calling the man’s insistence he never noticed the attractive, scantily clad blonde 'virtually impossible.'Judge Robert Fournier convicted Tena Tesso, 36, of sexual assault, concluding his 'evasive' account of what happened on Aug. 17, 2008, was simply 'incredible.'  The 24-year-old complainant, meanwhile, was 'as honest and frank as the day is long.'

The [victim] went straight from her waitressing job to the emergency room at the General hospital with abdominal pain at about 3 a.m.  Tesso ogled her [BL--sounds to me like the defendant was not the only one who ogled her!] in the waiting room then came into her exam room five times, offering her blankets because she was cold in a miniskirt and tank top.  She [testified that she] thanked Tesso but became uncomfortable when he asked if she had a boyfriend, brushed her buttocks as he changed the sheets beneath her — which weren’t soiled — and looked up her skirt.  But she [said she] gave [the defendant] the benefit of the doubt, thinking that Tesso — who wore white scrubs — was a foreign-trained doctor. She knew she’d been right all along when he put his hand in her shirt, touched her breasts and called her 'very beautiful.'  Testifying through an Ethiopian-dialect interpreter, Tesso denied doing anything but his job and said he didn’t even remember the woman until confronted by hospital officials.  [The defendant] refused to agree with prosecutor Paul Attia that the woman was attractive, insisting he only found his wife beautiful.   [Judge]Fournier scoffed at that.  'If 50 men, self-respecting, objective men, men who respect women, were to view (the woman), however briefly, they would conclude that she meets the standard of an attractive woman, at least in the city of Ottawa,' [Judge]Fournier said.  The accused refused to admit it because 'he knew it would bolster her account he was showing her undue attention,' Fournier argued.  'Here is a woman, relatively attractive, scantily dressed in a miniskirt, at times she is lying on the bed, exposing a great deal of her leg,' Fournier said. 
'This accused refuses to acknowledge he noticed that. In my view this is virtually impossible.'"

The Bad Lawyer loves this story!  They say a picture is worth a 1000 words; here, we have the  Judge's words, no picture necessary.   Just beneath the robe, is the mind of a 12 year old boy.    Judge Fournier, should bear in mind our recent accounts of Judge's gone wild, er wrong.  One piece of advice for Judge Fournier, don't "friend" her on Facebook.