A Montreal man has been sentenced to 18 years in prison for bringing an eight-year-old girl from Africa to Canada and sexually exploiting her over a three-year period.
The sentence was handed down Wednesday by Superior Court Justice Pierre Labelle at the Montreal courthouse.
Court documents state Sylvain Villemaire, a former school counsellor, paid the girl’s mother and claimed he would provide her with a good education in Canada. The girl’s country of origin cannot be named because of a court order protecting her identity.
Get breaking National news
READ MORE: 10, including 2 teens, charged in southern Alberta human trafficking investigation
Documents state Villemaire, 60, kept the girl as a prisoner until she was 11, sexually exploiting her multiple times a week, at times with another person.
- Marking National Day for Truth and Reconciliation at Fort Edmonton Park
- ‘We come here for healing’: Saskatoon holds fifth annual truth and reconciliation powwow
- ‘It was like a bomb’: Laval overpass collapse still haunts, 20 years later
- Young Canadians less hopeful about future of democracy: Statistics Canada
He pleaded guilty to sexual interference, invitation to sexual touching, possession of child pornography and accessing child pornography, in September 2020. He was found guilty of trafficking a minor and distribution of child pornography on Feb. 12, 2021.
Prosecutor Amelie Rivard has filed a request to have Villemaire declared a dangerous offender. That request will be heard by the court Oct. 12.
Comments
Comments closed.
Due to the sensitive and/or legal subject matter of some of the content on globalnews.ca, we reserve the ability to disable comments from time to time.
Please see our Commenting Policy for more.