WEIRD SEX ACTS

There is a saying that has been around for ages with respect to sex acts. It is; Different strokes for different folks. Adolf Hitler really got sexually aroused when he had woman urinate on his face. His young niece hated him doing that to her so she subsequently killed herself in his home.

Bestiality is a weird sex act. It involves having sexual relations between a person and an animal. This is illegal of course. Strange as it might seem, women have had sex with male animals but for the most part, it is men who do this disgusting sex act.

This article is about a really disgusting man who did an act involving his dog and his two young stepdaughters. I am referring to him by the letters of his name which is D.LW.

 After a 38‑day trial, D.L.W. was convicted of numerous sexual offences against his two stepdaughters committed over the course of 10 years, including a single count of bestiality D.L.W. first brought the family dog into the bedroom with the older complainant when she was 15 or 16 years old. He attempted to make the dog have intercourse with her and, when that failed, he spread peanut butter on her vagina and took photographs while the dog licked it off. He later asked her to do this again so he could make a video of that act.

The trial judge preferred to interpret the elements of bestiality so that they would reflect the current views on what constitutes prohibited sexual acts. A majority of the Court of Appeal allowed D.L.W.’s appeal against the bestiality conviction and acquitted him of the bestiality count. The majority concluded that the term “bestiality” had a common law meaning that included penetration as one of its essential elements. The dissenting judge found that penetration was not an element of bestiality and he would have dismissed the appeal.

Since 1955, criminal offences in Canada (apart from criminal contempt) have been entirely statutory. However, the common law (previous court decisions) continues to play an important role in defining criminal conduct since defining the elements of statutory offences often requires reference to common law concepts. Applying the principles that guide statutory interpretation leads to the conclusion in this case that the term “bestiality” has a well‑established legal meaning and refers to sexual intercourse between a human and an animal. Penetration has always been understood to be an essential element of  bestiality.

Parliament adopted that term without adding a definition of it and the legislative history and evolution of the relevant provisions show no intent to depart from the well‑understood legal meaning of the term. Moreover, the courts should not, by development of the common law, broaden the scope of liability for the offence of bestiality. Any expansion of criminal liability for this offence is within Parliament’s exclusive domain.

When Parliament uses a term with a legal meaning, it generally intends the term to be given that meaning. Words that have a well‑understood legal meaning when used in a statute should be given that meaning unless Parliament clearly indicates otherwise.

A further consideration is the related principle of stability in the law which means that absent clear legislative intention to the contrary, a statute should not be interpreted as substantially changing the law, including the common law. Parliament is deemed to know the existing law and is unlikely to have intended any significant changes to it unless that intention is made clear. While these interpretive principles are easy to state, how they apply in particular cases may be controversial. Sometimes, the controversy concerns the state of the common law when Parliament acted: in other words, the debate is about whether the term used had a clearly understood legal meaning when it was incorporated into the statute. In this case, the term “bestiality” did have a clear legal meaning when Parliament used that term without further definition in the English version of the 1955 Criminal Code. 

Bestiality meant buggery with an animal and required penetration. It was clear that to secure a conviction, the prosecution had to prove that penetration of an animal, or, in the case of women, penetration by an animal, had occurred.

This was the state of the law when the Offences Against the Person Act, 1861 was enacted in England. The offence in substantially the same form was carried over into the first English version of the Canadian Criminal Code in 1892 and continued to be in force until the offence called was introduced into the English version of the Code in the 1955 revisions.

 In Canada, as in England, the early history of the offence shows that what was commonly called “bestiality” was subsumed under the offences named sodomy or buggery and that penetration was one of its essential elements. The English language version of the Canadian statute simply provided that buggery with an animal was an offence, but did not further define it. However, the French version of “buggery meant with any other living creature” being “bestialité” defines “buggery with an animal” and “bestiality” were the same thing. There can be no serious dispute that the Canadian offence of buggery with an animal/la bestialité in the 1892 Code, which continued to be in force until the 1955 revisions, had a widely and generally understood meaning: the offence required sexual penetration between a human and an animal. Parliament, by using that term without further definition, intended to adopt that well‑understood legal meaning.

 A complete overhaul of sexual offences against the person in 1983 was followed by the 1988 revisions which were focused on enhancing the protection of children against sexual abuse. In 1988, among other things, the new legislation repealed the former buggery offence and replaced it with the new offence of anal intercourse and bestiality was given its own section. Through all of the many changes, changes which included fundamental revisions of the definition of several sexual offences and the repeal of others, the Code continued to make bestiality an offence without further defining it. The fact that Parliament made no change to the definition of bestiality in the midst of a comprehensive revision of the sexual offences supports only the conclusion that it intended to retain its well‑understood legal meaning. It defies logic to think that Parliament would rename, redefine and create new sexual offences in a virtually complete overhaul of the sexual offence provisions in 1983 and 1988 and yet would continue to use an ancient legal term with a well‑understood meaning — bestiality — without further definition in order to bring about a substantive difference in the law. The new bestiality offences added in the 1988 revision, while not changing the definition of the underlying offence, added protections for children in relation to that offence.       

The absence of a requirement of penetration does not broaden the scope of bestiality. It is more a reflection of Parliament’s common sense assumption that since penetration is physically impossible with most animals and for half the population, requiring it as an element of the offence eliminates from censure most sexually exploitative conduct with animals. Acts with animals that have a sexual purpose are inherently exploitative whether or not penetration occurs, and the prevention of sexual exploitation is what the 1988 Amendments were all about.               

As a result of this particular sex abuse case, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled 7 to 1 that humans having sexual contact with animals is not illegal if there is no “penetration” involved in the act.

In its ruling, the court decided that the legislation had not clearly defined the terms in the country’s bestiality laws and the way the statute is written should be read to only outlaw animal penetration, whether that penetration is animal to human or vice versa. In this particular case, this isn’t what happened.

This doesn’t mean that the disgusting stepfather didn’t sexually abuse his two stepdaughters.  For those acts, he was severely punished by the trial judge. 

The trial judge said at the end of the trial; As a result, I amend my prior ruling in 2013 BCSC 1327 (CanLII). I hold that the offender will be sentenced on Counts 3 and 7 (sexual interference) and a conditional stay of proceedings will be entered on Counts 1 and 2 (sexual assault). “

The sentence:

On Count 3 (s. 151), being the sexual interference count in relation to the older complainant, a period of 7 years’ imprisonment;

   On Count 4 (s. 152), being the count of invitation to sexual touching in relation to the older complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 3;

  On Count 5 (s. 153(1)(a)), being the count of sexual interference by a person in a position of trust or authority towards the older complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 3;

On Count 6 (s. 153(1)(b)), being the count of invitation to sexual touching by a person in a position of trust or authority towards the older complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 3;

On Count 7 (s. 151), being the sexual interference count in relation to the younger complainant, a period of 7 years’ imprisonment. This sentence will be served consecutive to the sentence imposed on Count 3;

On Count 8 (s. 152), being the count of invitation to sexual touching in relation to the younger complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 7;

 On Count 9 (s. 153(1)(a)), being the count of sexual interference by a person in a position of trust or authority towards the younger complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 7;

On Count 10 (s. 153(1)(b)), being the count of invitation to sexual touching by a person in a position of trust or authority towards the younger complainant, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 7;

 On Count 11 (s. 163.1(2)), being the making of child pornography count, a period of 2 years’ imprisonment to be served consecutive to the sentence imposed on Count 7;

On Count 12 (s. 163.1(4)), being the possession of child pornography count, a period of 2 years to be served concurrent with the sentence on Count 11; and

 On Count 13 (s. 160(1)), being the bestiality count, a period of 2 years’ imprisonment to be served consecutive to the sentence imposed on Count 11.

This is a total of 18 years’ imprisonment. After considering the principle of totality, the cumulative sentence imposed for all of the offences for which D.L.W. has been found guilty will be 16 years’ (192 months)  imprisonment. This is to be achieved by reducing the sentences on Counts 3 and 7 to six years’ imprisonment each.

While he is serving his time in prison, he will be placed in the protective custody section of the penitentiary in British Columbia.

Under Canadian law, this disgusting man can apply for parole after he has served 64 months. If he isn’t released by then, he will automatically be released after serving the remaining 128 months in prison. After that, he will be on parole for the part of the sentence he would have served if he wasn’t released.   He will also be listed on  the  federal list as a sex offender for the rest of his life. Further, he will never be able to enter the United States or even fly over the United States.