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Bombshell photos show teen having sex with Durham cop’s ex-wife

 

Accuser motivated by money, argues Constable Scott Terry’s defence lawyer

Jeff Mitchell
jmitchell@durhamregion.com

OSHAWA -- A woman who accuses a Durham cop of sexually assaulting her more than a decade ago is lying in court to ensure a payoff from a lawsuit she’s launched, a defence lawyer has asserted.

    Defence lawyer Danielle Robitaille accused the woman of outright perjury, at one point tendering photos of her engaging in sex acts with another woman to prove her point.
    “You are the kind of liar who makes things up as she goes along,” Ms. Robitaille said to the woman, who alleges she was sexually exploited by Durham police Constable Scott Andrew Terry 14 years ago, when she was 16. Ms. Robitaille accused the woman of tailoring her testimony at Const. Terry’s trial to ensure a conviction so that she’ll be successful in a $2 million lawsuit she’s filed against the officer and Durham Regional Police.
    “You have a financial stake in this prosecution,” Ms. Robitaille said Wednesday. “That’s money you’re counting on.”

    “I’m not counting on it,” the wom an, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, shot back. “The money I could care less about; that’s not the point.”
    Const. Terry, a 28-year veteran of the Durham police, has pleaded not guilty to five charges including sexual assault, breach of trust and making and possessing child pornography. The Crown alleges that Const. Terry, who first encountered the complainant when she was busted for shoplifting in 2000, exploited the girl.
    Instead of processing the shoplifting charge he offered the teen a room in his house and then subjected her to an escalating campaign of sexual activity that began with flirtatious comments and progressed to nude photographs, sexual touching and eventually rape, court has heard.
    The woman, now 30, testified she complied with Const. Terry’s demands, including participating in sex with other women, because she feared he would resurrect the shoplifting charge or frame her for other crimes. She testified she lived at Const. Terry’s house from June of 2000 to February of 2001, and that she never returned after that.
    The woman, who began testifying Monday, said she waited until 2011 to come forward with her allegations because she feared Const. Terry would be protected by his police brothers.
    Ms. Robitaille worked meticulously at highlighting what she characterized as inconsistencies and omissions in the woman’s evidence, an exercise that culminated in her producing something of a bombshell -- pictures of the complainant and Const. Terry’s then-wife, engaging in oral sex.
    Ms. Robitaille suggested the pictures were taken in late 2001 -- long after the woman said she fled the house -- and that they depict consensual sex, an encounter the woman failed to reveal to investigators when she disclosed her allegations in 2011.
    “You omitted it because it was consensual,” Ms. Robitaille suggested. “You knew it would hurt your case.”
    “It was not consensual,” the woman replied. “I’ve never had any consensual relationship with a woman; I don’t desire it. It’s disgusting.”
    “You are perjuring yourself before the court,” Ms. Robitaille charged at one point.
    “I never went back, and I never had consensual sex,” the woman insisted.
    The trial continues before Superior Court Justice Bruce Glass in Oshawa.

Lots of white stuff won’t leave Oshawa in the red on snow budget

Budget includes $800,000 top-up for winter maintenance reserve

Reka Szekely
rszekely@durhamregion.com

    OSHAWA -- A rough winter means some municipalities may end up in the red on their snow budgets but Oshawa officials say the City should be fine.
    Nicole Pincombe, the City’s treasurer, explains that Oshawa has a winter maintenance reserve capped at $1 million in addition to the budget for winter maintenance. When a winter has fewer snowfalls, money in the winter maintenance budget is transferred to the reserve.
    “Those years where our winters are above average we would draw money from the reserve into the operating budget to offset the costs associated with an above-average winter,” she said.
    In 2013, the City budgeted $3.5 million for winter maintenance and the final costs are expected to be about $600,000 higher than that. The difference will be drawn from the reserve.
    Winter maintenance budgets are based on a five-year average and the City is projecting to spend $3.7 million in 2014. Because of the rough winter this season, the 2014 budget includes an additional $800,000 contribution to the winter reserve to top up that fund. Normally the City does not contribute to the reserve through the budget process.
    The numbers are still coming in but Ms. Pincombe said she didn’t believe the winter maintenance reserve would be fully exhausted at the end of 2013. She also believes the City is prepared for 2014, which not only includes this winter but November and December at the end of the year.
    Ms. Pincombe points out that municipalities are still waiting to hear back from the Province regarding disaster funding for the December ice storm. Some of the ice storm clean up costs will be part of the 2014 budget.
    “We’re hoping they will contribute to the costs because there were extraordinary costs the municipalities faced in having to respond to and clean up from the storm,” she said.