Not guilty ruling in Aldergrove sexual touching case

WARNING: This story discusses sexual assault

A judge found an Aldergrove man not guilty of sexual interference and invitation to sexual touching in a case involving the accused’s step-daughter a decade ago.

Justice Jacqueline Hughes said that after hearing testimony from the accused, his step-daughter, and other family members, she was left with reasonable doubt about whether incidents happened as described by the young woman.

Hughes’ ruling lays out the facts of the case. Because of a publication ban on identifying victims of sexual assaults, none of the people involved can be identified by name.

The accuser, identified as C.M. in the ruling, was eight years old at the time of the alleged incidents. She first made a statement to the police when she was 16 years old in 2020, and was 18 during the trial, which took place in New Westminster Supreme Court.

The accused, C.J.H., was in a relationship with C.M.’s mother, identified in the ruling as E.H., from about 2004 until 2014.

“As only C.M. and C.J.H. can testify about what is alleged to have occurred, their credibility is the central issue in this case,” Hughes wrote in her ruling. “This is not unusual in cases of this nature.”

While he lived with E.H. and C.M., C.J.H. acted like a step-father, taking C.M. to events and looking after her and her siblings in the house.

The incidents allegedly took place around Christmas of 2012, not long after the family had moved to Aldergrove. C.M. testified that both incidents took place relatively close together.

The judge noted inconsistencies between how C.M. described the incidents to police and how she described them to the court, including whether or not they took place on the same day or on different days.

She allegedly tried to tell her mother about the incidents once, but C.J.H. was there and shushed her.

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Hughes noted that C.M.’s narrative “was plausible and she did not embellish her testimony,” but that there was sometimes a lack of detail that went beyond what could be explained by the incidents taking place when she was a child.

“There were also significant internal inconsistencies, and some of the key details of the alleged incidents appear to have changed over time from when she gave her statement to the police and when she testified at trial,” Hughes wrote.

C.J.H.’s defence lawyer argued that the timing of the accusation was suspicious – it came a couple of months after C.J.H. and E.H. had begun a major dispute over the custody of their young son.

“While I am unable to definitively conclude that these factors motivated C.M. to fabricate the allegations against C.J.H., nor can I conclude that there is a proven absence of motive,” Hughes wrote.

C.J.H. testified in his own defence, denying that the incidents ever happened.

“Considered as a whole, I find no basis upon which to discount C.J.H.’s evidence,” wrote Hughes.