WARNING: The next particulars of the sexual assault case could also be disturbing, discretion is suggested.
Canadian musician Jacob Hoggard was discovered not responsible Friday of sexually assaulting a younger girl in northeastern Ontario eight years in the past, the end result of a roughly two-week trial that noticed each the singer and his accuser paint starkly totally different photos of what occurred.
Hoggard, wearing a darkish go well with, confronted the jury as the decision was delivered Friday night time in Haileybury, a group inside Temiskaming Shores, Ont.
Jurors had deliberated for lower than six hours earlier than delivering their unanimous verdict.
The previous Hedley frontman, who had pleaded not responsible to sexual assault within the case, nonetheless stays behind bars as he serves a five-year sentence for a special sexual assault conviction — a case jurors didn’t hear about throughout his trial.
Consent was the central concern within the trial as each the Crown and defence agreed Hoggard had a sexual encounter with the complainant in his resort room in Kirkland Lake, Ont., in June 2016.
The complainant and the singer each took the stand throughout the trial. The lady, whose identification is protected beneath a regular publication ban, was the Crown’s solely witness.
Jacob Hoggard is the previous frontman of the Canadian pop rock band Hedley. (File)
The complainant, who was 19 on the time, stated Hoggard raped, choked, hit and urinated on her, and known as her names like “soiled little piggy.” She testified that she was scared and crying, and repeatedly stated no and tried to combat him off. On two events, she bumped into the lavatory to throw up, she stated.
Hoggard saidthey had a consensual one-night stand after flirting and kissing on the bonfire. He denied that the complainant struggled, that he hit or choked her, that he pinned her down, that she ever stated she was uncomfortable and that he known as her names.
Hoggard stated the complainant urinated on him at his request after they’d consensual oral intercourse within the bathtub.
In his remaining directions Friday, Ontario Superior Courtroom Justice Robin Tremblay informed jurors that with the intention to discover Hoggard responsible, they need to consider past an inexpensive doubt that the complainant didn’t consent to any one of many particular sexual actions she stated occurred, and that Hoggard knew she didn’t consent.
Subject of consent was key
Consenting to at least one sexual act doesn’t imply consent is given for all or any different acts, and silence, submission or lack of resistance don’t signify consent, he defined Friday. Nor does following Hoggard to his resort room point out consent, he added.
He additionally cautioned jurors in opposition to making assumptions about what consensual sexual encounters are presupposed to seem like or “what sort of particular person is more likely to consent to a specific sort of sexual contact,” noting consensual intercourse can happen in quite a lot of contexts and embody many various kinds of actions.
Throughout their closing arguments Thursday, defence attorneys for the singer steered the girl lied concerning the nature of the encounter to cowl up her infidelity and protect her relationships along with her boyfriend and household.
They additional argued her account of what occurred that night time was rife with inconsistencies, with a number of particulars altering over time.
Prosecutors argued the girl had no motive to lie, noting there was no proof the folks in her life had been conscious of the incident, other than a cousin who accompanied her to the live performance.
Canadian musician Jacob Hoggard was discovered not responsible Friday of sexually assaulting a younger girl in northeastern Ontario eight years in the past. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/ Tijana Martin)
The Crown disputed a number of the alleged inaccuracies in her testimony, together with particulars concerning the automobile she rode in on her technique to the bonfire.
Prosecutor Peter Eager acknowledged there have been some inconsistencies on “peripheral particulars” of her account however argued she remained “unshaken” on the core parts of her allegations.
Hoggard, nonetheless, admitted to having two main gaps in his reminiscence of what occurred within the resort room, regardless of saying the night time was memorable partly as a result of it was the primary time a girl had urinated on him throughout intercourse.
Jurors did didn’t hear of the singer’s 2022 trial in Toronto, wherein he was discovered responsible of sexual assault inflicting bodily hurt in opposition to an Ottawa girl, and never responsible of the identical cost and of sexual interference in opposition to a teenage fan.
The panel additionally didn’t hear that Hoggard just lately started serving a five-year jail sentence in that case after Ontario’s highest court docket rejected his enchantment. He has utilized for depart to enchantment on the Supreme Courtroom of Canada.
This report by The Canadian Press was first revealed Oct. 4, 2024.
