A judge has stayed all charges in the sexual assault case against disgraced fashion mogul Peter Nygard in Winnipeg.
The judge found his right to a fair trial was violated by police failing to retain records related to allegations stemming from the 1990s.
Nygard appeared via video link in a Winnipeg courtroom, where provincial court Judge Mary Kate Harvie read her decision Wednesday following arguments in the case in September.
The complainant in the case, whose name has been protected under a publication ban, alleged Nygard sexually assaulted her at his Winnipeg warehouse in November 1993.
She spoke about it with police officers, including in Vancouver.
The investigation was launched by Winnipeg police in 2020.
Nygard’s lawyer, Gerri Wiebe, filed a motion for a stay of the proceedings in September, arguing her client had been denied the right to a fair trial on the basis that officers who interviewed the woman in 1993 were unable to produce documentation of their exchanges.
Nygard’s trial on the allegations had been scheduled for December.
