The lawyer for Skipp Anderson said his client is relieved after being acquitted of sexual assault in his retrial on the same charge.
The verdict was handed down in a Saskatoon courtroom on Wednesday morning.
“This has been a very difficult case on his family. To say he’s relieved, I think, would be an understatement,” Brian Pfefferle said outside of court.
Justice Alison Rothery said the essential element the Crown had to prove was that the man did not consent to having sex with Anderson.
She said the Crown failed to prove this beyond a reasonable doubt.
Anderson, the former owner of Pink Lounge & Nightclub, was accused of having intercourse with another man without his consent.
Anderson had hosted a hot tub party and the assault is alleged to have happened hours after the man, who was 22 at the time, got drunk and was taken to a bed in a spare room.
The complainant said he didn’t remember anything between roughly 11:30 p.m. on July 10 and 3:30 a.m. on July 11 when the assault allegedly took place.
Anderson said he thought the man was sober and consenting during sex. He said they were communicating during the act.
In reaching her decision, Rothery noted the complainant was able to get up, phone a friend, talk to Anderson about being embarrassed and then return to bed with him.
Pfefferle believes a sound judgment was made in what he said was a difficult case.
“The only thing that matters in a sexual assault case is typically the evidence of the complainant and the accused,” Pfefferle said.
“In this particular case, the accused’s evidence could not be disputed by any of the witnesses.”
Crown prosecutor Katharine Grier said she wasn’t that surprised with the acquittal, but is disappointed.
“From our perspective, it was unfortunate and especially given that there previously had been a conviction,” Grier said.
Grier said it is too soon to see if there are grounds for an appeal.
“We’d have to review that because there was a lengthy oral decision and I was madly taking notes so I’d have to review it,” she said.
Another factor Grier said she has to consider is victim fatigue.
“You have to look at things like victim fatigue because people have testified now three times, preliminary inquiry, two trials. It’s a very stressful thing.”
In January 2018, a jury found Anderson guilty of sexually assaulting the man. He was sentenced to 30 months in prison.
The conviction was overturned in March 2019 after the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal determined the jury heard prejudicial information and wasn’t properly instructed by the judge.
— Ryan Kessler contributed to this report
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