ONTARIO

SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE

COURT FILE NO.: CR-23-002-0000

DATE: 2026 02 24

BETWEEN:

HIS MAJESTY THE KING – and – K.T.

A. Camilletti, for the Crown

A. Morrow, for K.T.

HEARD: February 24, 2026

REASONS FOR SENTENCE

I. The Facts

[ 1 ] K.T. is before the Court to be sentenced after pleading guilty to, being found guilty of, and now being convicted of count one on the Indictment dated 17 January 2023, namely, that, between June and December 2018, he did for a sexual purpose touch his biological daughter, a person under the age of 16 years and in fact just 12 years old at the time, directly with a part of his body – his hand, contrary to section 151 of the Criminal Code .

[ 2 ] That offence is commonly known as sexual interference.

[ 3 ] The facts are that the offender, on multiple occasions over the approximate six-month period, at the family residence, touched his minor biological daughter with his hands on her bare breasts underneath her clothing as well as on her vagina underneath her clothing. He also asked her to touch his penis, while displaying his penis to his daughter, but she declined to do so.

[ 4 ] At the time, the victim had a known social anxiety disorder and a known genetic disorder that caused her to experience some learning difficulties and to present as being less mature than her actual age.

[ 5 ] It was the offender himself who disclosed the child sexual abuse perpetrated against his daughter. He confessed the abuse to a male friend on November 11, 2020. Not long after that disclosure, while at the hospital because of his suicidal thoughts and the need for urgent psychiatric treatment, the offender was arrested by the police and released on his own Undertaking with conditions.

[ 6 ] Unsurprisingly, the criminal offence committed by K.T. has had a profound impact on the entire family, as illustrated in Exhibits 1, 2, and 3 – the Victim Impact Statements that have been filed. As the authors of those statements have stated so eloquently, the gross abuse of trust experienced here is difficult for them to comprehend and would appear to be impossible for them to overcome.

II. The Circumstances of the Offender

[ 7 ] K.T. is currently 48 years old. In addition to the victim, he has another child – a son who is a few years younger than the victim.

[ 8 ] K.T. has no criminal record of any kind. He has the devotion and the enduring love of his mother, now 73 years of age, as exemplified in her letter dated November 17, 2025 and marked Exhibit 4.

[ 9 ] The offender’s personal history has been so fulsomely presented to this Court because of the very able submissions advanced by his counsel, Ms. Morrow, and the exhaustive work of Dr. Achal Mishra who prepared a comprehensive psychiatric report dated November 9, 2025 and marked Exhibit 6.

[ 10 ] This Court cannot adequately summarize Dr. Mishra’s 42-page report in a sentencing decision, however, a few of the most noteworthy items are below:

(i) K.T.’s childhood was plagued with disorder – his father abusing his mother; his father abusing him; his father being suicidal; alcohol abuse within the family; and the offender himself having chronic suicidal thoughts beginning at the tender age of just 10 years old;

(ii) the offender attempted to kill himself while attending university;

(iii) despite these significant challenges, the offender had good employment at the Bruce Nuclear power plant for many years up until May 2018, when he went off on sick leave;

(iv) K.T. was married to the mother of his two children in 2005, the year prior to the birth of the victim;

(v) the marriage effectively ended in June 2019, at the instance of the offender’s wife;

(vi) by the time of the marital separation, and beginning years before the offence period, K.T. had undergone psychiatric care and had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder;

(vii) other psychiatric diagnoses followed in the years between 2014 and 2018;

(viii) overall, the offender’s medical history shows an escalation in concerns about his mental health and increased alcohol abuse at a time that was proximate to the offence period;

(ix) following his arrest for sexually abusing his daughter, K.T. continued to receive psychiatric care while living away from the rest of his immediate family;

(x) K.T.’s formal diagnoses include the following: major depressive disorder (historical); paedophilic disorder (historical); alcohol use disorder, moderate to severe (historical); unspecified tic disorder; generalized anxiety disorder (historical); and specific phobia, animal (spiders, historical);

(xi) after having conducted a formal risk assessment, Dr. Mishra opined that K.T. presents with a “very low” risk of sexually re-offending;

(xii) in the opinion of Dr. Mishra, K.T. is not a malingerer but rather is someone who accepts full responsibility for what he has done and is very remorseful for what he has done – this Court would add that I have the same impression after listening to the offender’s lengthy allocution delivered during the sentencing hearing; and

(xiii) in the opinion of Dr. Mishra, K.T. needs to be comprehensively assessed to determine the most suitable intervention for his sexual offending, and, if sentenced to a period of imprisonment, the Ontario Correctional Institute would be well-suited to meet his needs.

[ 11 ] Of course, the Ontario Correctional Institute is a provincial facility and not a federal penitentiary. K.T. would not be eligible to be housed at that facility if he is sentenced to two years or more in prison.

III. The Positions of the Crown and the Defence

[ 12 ] All of the ancillary orders sought by the Crown are on consent. The victim fine surcharge is hereby waived in light of the overall disposition on sentence.

[ 13 ] The following ancillary orders are hereby issued: a primary DNA order; a section 109 Criminal Code firearms and weapons prohibition order for ten years and life as per the two subsections; a SOIRA order for a duration of twenty years; a section 161 Criminal Code order for a duration of twenty years; and a section 743.21 Criminal Code non-communication order regarding both the victim and A.T., with exceptions for communication through legal counsel or pursuant to a valid family court order made after today.

[ 14 ] The section 161 Criminal Code order is made under clauses (1)(a), ( a.1 ), (b), and (c). Under clause (a.1), the prohibited radius is within two kilometers of the victim.

[ 15 ] Where counsel disagree is only in terms of the custodial aspect of the sentence to be imposed by this Court. The Crown advocates for a penitentiary sentence of four years in length, while the defence requests a reformatory sentence of two years less one day in length and with a period of probation to follow.

IV. Analysis

The Principles of Sentencing

[ 16 ] The fundamental purpose of sentencing, which is a highly individualized process, is that the sentence imposed must be proportionate to the gravity of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the offender – section 718.1 of the Criminal Code .

[ 17 ] Sentencing is more art than science. It is a delicate and difficult balancing exercise. It involves, by definition, a great deal of discretion on the part of the judge who is presiding over the case. Even fairly-well entrenched sentencing ranges can be departed from in the right case. A sentence that is below or above what is perceived as the “normal”, or a sentence that falls outside of what is accepted as the general range, is not necessarily an unfit sentence. The Supreme Court of Canada has recognized each of these things, many times, including in its decision in R. v. Lacasse , 2015 SCC 64 .

[ 18 ] Put another way, in order to respect the individualization of sentences that are imposed, although there are guidelines, and ranges, and although a judge’s discretion is not completely unfettered, there are no hard and fast rules that apply no matter what. R. v. Nasogaluak , 2010 SCC 6 , at paragraph 44 .

[ 19 ] In this case, it is undisputed that the paramount sentencing objectives are (i) denunciation and (ii) deterrence (both general and specific). Parliament has told us that in, for example, section 718.01 of the Criminal Code . The Supreme Court of Canada has told us that in, for example, the seminal decision in R. v. Friesen , 2020 SCC 9 , at paragraph 95 .

[ 20 ] I agree with Ms. Morrow, however, that the principles of rehabilitation and restraint, although not paramount considerations on sentencing, remain relevant in this case. Several of the decisions being relied upon by the defence, including as just one example the decision of Justice Spies in R. v. I.C. , 2024 ONSC 1406 , at paragraph 17 , citing R. v. Priest , 1996 1381 (ON CA) , at paragraph 23 , support that notion.

[ 21 ] I also agree with Ms. Morrow that there is jurisprudential authority to support the position that she has advanced in our case, not despite but rather in conjunction with Friesen . As just one example, there is the thoughtful decision of Justice Richardson in R. v. T.A. , 2022 ONCJ 528 , where a 70-year-old step-grandfather pleaded guilty to sexual interference against his step-granddaughter and was sentenced to the “maximum reformatory sentence to be followed by the maximum period of probation” (paragraph 131).

[ 22 ] I agree further with Ms. Morrow that, in sentencing an offender who has committed sexual interference, the application of the analytical framework set out in Friesen is capable of being undertaken without necessarily the imposition of a penitentiary sentence of imprisonment. It depends on the individual circumstances of the offender and the facts of the case, as evidenced by the decision of Justice Dorey in R. v. G.J.M. , 2023 BCPC 288 , for instance.

The Aggravating and Mitigating Factors

[ 23 ] I agree with the Crown that there are numerous aggravating factors in this case:

(i) the gross abuse of trust in having a father repeatedly sexually abuse his 12-year-old daughter;

(ii) the repeated nature of the sexual abuse perpetrated by K.T. against his daughter over several months;

(iii) the tender age of the victim;

(iv) the fact that K.T. sexually touched his minor daughter in more than one way and underneath her clothing;

(v) the fact that the sexual abuse was perpetrated against a known vulnerable child with mental health issues of her own; and

(vi) the significant degree of harm that K.T.’s criminal conduct has had on the entire family.

[ 24 ] In mitigation, we must remember that K.T. pleaded guilty to the offence, and I accept that the plea was entered late but was always intended (in fact, I know that from having conducted a judicial pretrial in the matter long ago) and was entered in the face of triable issues.

[ 25 ] We must also remember that K.T. is before this Court as a first-offender and with a lengthy history of serious mental illness of his own.

What is a Fit Sentence for K.T.?

[ 26 ] Notwithstanding the very able submissions made by Ms. Morrow, I am not of the view that a reformatory sentence in a provincial jail would be appropriate in this case.

[ 27 ] Although such a sentence would likely help rehabilitate K.T. and would probably be more consistent with the principle of restraint, it would not, in my respectful opinion, sufficiency meet what is most paramount in this case – the objectives of denunciation and deterrence. Further, it would not give adequate weight to the many serious aggravating factors that are present in this case.

[ 28 ] This is not a 70-year-old step-grandfather who sexually touched his step-granddaughter over her clothing, for instance. This is a man in his late forties who repeatedly touched the bare breasts and the bare vagina of his vulnerable 12-year-old biological daughter.

The point is that every case is different. Ours, in my view, must result in a significant penitentiary sentence of imprisonment.

[ 29 ] There are marked similarities between our case and the case of R. v. J.H. , 2022 ONCJ 271 , a decision of Justice Rose. That was also a guilty plea. That was also multiple incidents of sexual touching over a period of several months. That was also a father abusing his own biological daughter. That was also a first-time offender, also not elderly but also an adult (30 years old), and similarly one who had confessed and who was very remorseful.

[ 30 ] Justice Rose imposed on that offender precisely what the Crown is requesting here, four years’ imprisonment.

[ 31 ] I do think, however, that the degree of sexual touching in that case was even more severe than in ours. That offender, among other things, forced his daughter to masturbate his penis until he ejaculated, and he also licked his daughter’s breasts, and he also tried to lick his daughter’s vagina. J.T. did not do any of those things.

[ 32 ] All things considered, I believe that the sentence imposed on our offender should be somewhat less than four years in custody.

[ 33 ] For these reasons, on count one on the Indictment, this Court sentences K.T. to a period of imprisonment of 42 months (3.5 years in the penitentiary).

Conlan J.

Released: February 24, 2026

COURT FILE NO.: CR-23-002-0000

DATE: 2026 02 24

ONTARIO SUPERIOR COURT OF JUSTICE HIS MAJESTY THE KING – and – K.T. REASONS FOR Sentence Conlan J.

Released: February 24, 2026