Warning: this story contains details of sexual assault and incest.
A Saskatchewan man who pleaded guilty to sexual assault and incest is now serving a decade-long prison sentence.
The 58-year-old man, from a community west of Saskatoon, cannot be identified to protect the identities of his victims.
They include a daughter who he repeatedly sexually assaulted, starting when she was 14 until she was 17.
The crimes came to light when the girl’s mother went to the RCMP in the spring of 2025 and told them her husband was having sex with their daughter, Crown prosecutor Lana Morelli said.
Morelli read the agreed facts aloud in Saskatoon Court of King’s Bench on Friday during the man’s sentencing hearing.
“There were times when [the mother] had to wait in her chair … for the offender to finish having intercourse with [their daughter] before [the mother] could go to bed for the evening,” Morelli said.
“[The mother] was tired of what was happening.”
The woman told police she had “numerous discussions” with her husband about it, and that he appeared proud of himself, Morelli said.
When police interviewed the daughter, she told them that the first time it happened, her father asked her to have sex and she said no, but it happened anyway and continued happening.
She said her father told her not to tell anyone or he would “go away,” and she didn’t want him to get in trouble.
Other incidents came to light when police talked to family members.
The man also pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting his sister. That assault happened 40 years ago, when she was 14 and he was 18. He tried to have sex with her while she was asleep on a couch.
He also pleaded guilty to assault for inappropriately touching another of his teenage daughters by putting his hand under her clothes on her chest without her consent.
Morelli and defence lawyer Shea Neudorf jointly recommended a total sentence of 10 and a half years.
Neudorf noted that her client’s guilty pleas saved the need for a lengthy trial, and “more significantly,” saved the complainants from having to testify in court about what happened to them.
The man also spoke briefly, tearfully asking to be forgiven and telling the judge, “I’ve failed my family, my sisters, my daughters. I failed my wife as a husband. I’ve failed society as a whole.”
Justice Krista Zerr said the man admitting what he did was a “significant factor” in her decision to endorse the joint sentencing submission.
The victim impact statements included a poem written by one of the daughters, and a “compelling drawing” by another daughter, Zerr said.
“Both of those have affected me profoundly and I will not forget them,” the judge said.
Zerr said what resonated in the victim statements were feelings of shame and confusion, and references to gaslighting.
“There’s the suggestion that for a period of time, someone who was in a position of trust not only was doing the physical acts, but manipulating the narrative around that, which is incredibly damaging,” she said.
The judge said she hopes the man’s guilty plea and sentencing will help the rest of the family put the responsibility in the right place.
“If there is shame, it is [the man’s] shame,” Zerr said.
