Benjamin Levin’s daughters say former Ontario deputy minister never sexually abused them
Tyler Anderson / National PostBenjamin
Levin, former Ontario Deputy Education Minister charged with child
pornography, enters court with his lawyer Clayton Ruby (right) for the
first day of his sentencing in Toronto, Monday April 13, 2015.
There was no sexual abuse in the Levin home, each daughter wrote in letters that extolled their father’s virtues as a man who gave his daughters “confidence” and “life advice.”
The former Ontario and Manitoba deputy education minister claimed, in Internet incest chat rooms, to have abused his daughters beginning at age 12. Though he pleaded guilty to making written child pornography, possessing child pornography and counseling to commit sexual assault on a child, he has not been charged with “hands-on” child sexual abuse.
“I have always felt completely safe with my father,” one wrote. “He never sexually assaulted me nor behaved or spoke in any inappropriate ways with me. As a child and teen, our home was a place where I always felt safe to bring my friends and, to the extent of my knowledge, my friends (some of whom spent a great deal of time in our home) always felt safe there.”
As a child and teen, our home was a place where I always felt safe to bring my friendsIn his submissions Wednesday, the 63-year-old’s defence lawyer Clayton Ruby argued that the 34 character reference letters his client received — which include these from his daughters as well as his wife, family friends and ex-colleagues mostly from his time in Manitoba — show him to have been a “pro-social” and “exemplary” person in both his professional life in education and with his family.
“None of it excuses what he did. But it is relevant for the question of what is a just and appropriate sentence given the circumstances,” Ruby said.
Ontario Court of Justice judge Heather McArthur challenged Ruby on the “moral blameworthiness” Levin held, having been someone with professional understanding of the development of children.
“He more than most would know how horribly, horribly wrong this was,” she said. Ruby pushed back: “[That’s] the equivalent of saying ‘He’s brighter than the average guy, so we’re going to punish him more heavily.’ You do not do that.”
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Alexandra NewbouldIn
this court artist's sketch, Benjamin Levin (left to right), Justice
Heather McArthur, forensic psychiatrist Julian Gojer and crown
co-counsel Patricia Garcia appear in court in Toronto, Monday.
In her letter, his wife says she talked with her daughters about whether they’d been sexually abused by their father. They told her there was “no hint of this.”
“I do not condone what Ben did,” she wrote. “However, I do know that his claims in recent internet chats (as per the Statement of Facts) that he and his wife abused their daughters and other children, are totally false. I believe him when he states that he never intended to have any sexual contact with a child and that his activities on the internet were all about sexual fantasies with adults on which he had no intention of ever acting.”
She says he was under a lot of stress at this time of his life — something forensic psychiatrist Dr. Julian Gojer noted in his testimony Monday. Levin’s wife spent much of her letter chronicling how Levin’s professional life fell apart after his arrest — suspended from his professorship at the University of Toronto’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, where he was once lauded as an international education leader. Organizations began to sever ties with him and once frequent speaking engagements dried up.
Ruby, too, referenced the “public shaming” and “stigma” Levin has already endured. He is trying to see Levin sentenced to two years in prison, while the Crown is seeking a sentence of three and a half years.
Ruby also argued Wednesday that a penitentiary would be a “violent” place for a man of Levin’s age and crimes, full of younger, stronger inmates. He will argue that the sentence be served concurrently rather than consecutively, which is what the Crown wants.
Much of the sentencing, which began Monday, has squared on parsing fantasy from reality. The Crown worked hard in their submissions to suggest Levin had crossed a line from explicit, sado-masochistic discussions of child sexual abuse online towards the realm of reality. They suggested a brief meeting with a British parent Levin had met on these chat rooms at the Amsterdam airport crossed the line from what the defence has tried to characterize as mere “fantasy” to reality. There is no evidence a child was present at this meeting.
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/benjamin-levins-daughters-say-former-ontario-deputy-minister-never-sexually-abused-them
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