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The Canadian Press - ONLINE EDITION

Ottawa cop killer guilty of sexually assaulting 10-year-old girl

By: The Canadian Press

Posted: 09/19/2012 5:12 PM | Comments: 0 | Last Modified: 09/20/2012 8:57 AM

Kevin Gregson, in Ottawa on Dec. 30, 2009. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Pawel Dwulit

OTTAWA - A former Mountie serving life in prison for killing an Ottawa police officer has been convicted of repeatedly sexually assaulting a 10-year-old girl in the week before the cop's murder.

An Ontario Supreme Court justice found 46-year-old Kevin Gregson guilty on Wednesday of four counts of sexual assault causing bodily harm and four counts of sexual interference, and sentenced him to 10 years in prison.

The victim told court Gregson raped her four times over the span of a few days.

The assaults occurred before Const. Eric Czapnik was stabbed to death on Dec. 29, 2009, while he sat in his patrol car at the Ottawa Hospital Civic Campus.

Gregson was convicted last March of first-degree murder in the officer's killing and was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.

He had been dismissed by the RCMP in 2006 for disciplinary and behavioural problems and was appealing that dismissal at the time of the killing.

Gregson's latest conviction will be served in conjunction with his life sentence.

The Crown had been seeking a decade-long sentence, and prosecutor Brian Holowka said he was happy that's what Gregson received.

"Obviously we're gratified, we're pleased with the sentence, we asked for 10 years and we felt that the facts of the case and the sentencing principles called for a 10-year sentence," Holowka said outside court.

In her victim-impact statement, which she was too upset to read aloud in court, the girl said she would forgive the former Mountie for "all the trauma and hurt and scared and changes this has done to me."

She asked Gregson to apologize, but said he could say the words even if he was alone.

When speaking to the court, Gregson did not mention the sexual assaults and instead returned to the topic of Czapnik's death.

"I didn't kill Czapnik, I mean, I didn't murder him," he said. "It's strange, I had a dream when I was 20 about this, about this happening to me."

(CFRA)

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