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Woman gets 16 months for sexual assault of boy, 13

By: Mike McIntyre

Posted: 10/2/2012 12:13 PM | Last Modified: 10/2/2012 2:44 PM | Updates

A 32-year-old Winnipeg woman has been sentenced to 16 months in jail for coercing sex from a 13-year-old boy.

Samantha Mason was convicted of sexual assault earlier this year on the grounds the victim was too young to give legal consent under the Criminal Code. She has serious mental-health problems and had just been released from a psychiatric facility when the incident happened, court was told.

Mason moved in with a friend, who is the parent of a teenage daughter. One day the 13-year-old boy visited the daughter. A drunken Mason convinced the boy to sneak away for sex.

The Crown was seeking an 18-month sentence. They admitted the typical starting point for a sexual-assault sentence is about three years in prison, but said they were asking for much less based on the "mitigating" factors in this case including Mason’s mental state.

Mason’s lawyer had asked for no further jail time, saying her seven months of pretrial custody was sufficient. Queen’s Bench Justice Brenda Keyser ultimately decided to give Mason another nine months in jail, in addition to time served.

Mason was also placed on three years of supervised probation and will be entered on the national sex offender registry for the next 20 years.

www.mikeoncrime.com