Oral Clarke could be facing at least another year in jail if a provincial court judge agrees with a Crown suggestion on sentencing.
Clarke, 65, appeared in provincial court in Corner Brook on Wednesday afternoon via videoconference from the Bishops Falls Correctional Centre.
The St. Jude’s man is currently serving a 20-month sentences on charges of unlawfully luring a child under 18 by means of a computer system and possessing child pornography.
His appearance on Wednesday was to begin a sentencing hearing on another charge of unlawfully luring a child (under the age of 16) by means of a computer system.
While the details of his first conviction were noted in court, Crown attorney Trina Simms said she would not be tendering Clarke’s record at the hearing.
The incident he is being sentenced on occurred before the others and came to light as a result of that investigation.
That means Clarke is still being sentenced as if he was a first-time offender.
She said it’s not unusual under these circumstances where an investigation reveals a victim who is not identified in the first part of the investigation.
“So, on today’s date, Mr. Clarke is being sentenced in relation to one victim, but it came to light of the investigators as a result of being investigated on other matters.”
Clarke was first arrested on Feb. 10, 2017 as a result of an investigation by the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit of Newfoundland and Labrador Internet Child Exploitation Team.
That investigation revealed Clarke had communicated with an 11-year-old girl using the name Ammon Charlebois and claiming he was a 12-year-old boy from Grand Falls-Windsor.
On Aug. 24, 2017 a police officer had reason to access the Facebook account of a young girl in an unrelated investigation. The Facebook profile of the victim in the charge before the court was present in the timeline and the officer recognized her as one of the girls previously seen in the images found on Clarke’s computer.
The girl was located and interviewed by police. Her parents checked her devices and confirmed she chatted with Ammon Charlebois.
Police were given consent to search her devices for evidence of chat exchanges with him. The two had chatted between December 2014 and May 2016 using both Facebook and Skype.
Simms read out some parts of the chats that police were able to extract that were explicit and included Clarke asking to see parts of the girl’s body and telling her he wanted to have sex with her.
The girl did send photos to Clarke, but there were no nude photos.
Simms said the Crown is seeking a 12-18-month jail term and that it be served consecutive to the sentence he is already serving.
The Crown is also asking for a lifetime designation as a sexual offender under the Sex Offender Registry Act, a DNA order, a prohibition for 10 years under Section 161 of the criminal code that would prohibit him from having contact with anyone under the age of 16 and a five-year firearms prohibition.
Clarke’s lawyer, Jim Goudie, reiterated many of the things he spoke of at Clarke’s previous sentencing and asked that the new sentence be on the lower end of the range at 12 months and that it be concurrent to his current sentence that he began serving in June 2017.
Judge Wayne Gorman will render his decision on sentencing on March 27.
Section 161 of the Criminal Code of Canada prohibits an offender convicted of an offence in respect to a person under the age of 16 from:
attending a public park or public swimming area where persons under the age of 16 years are present or can reasonably be expected to be present, or a daycare centre, schoolground, playground or community centre;
seeking, obtaining or continuing any employment, whether or not the employment is remunerated, or becoming or being a volunteer in a capacity, that involves being in a position of trust or authority towards persons under the age of 16 years;
having any contact — including communicating by any means — with a person who is under the age of 16 years, unless the offender does so under the supervision of a person whom the court considers appropriate; or
using the Internet or other digital network, unless the offender does so in accordance with conditions set by the court.
