Judge sentences daycare pedophile, child pornographer to 12 years in prison

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This article was published 19/10/2023 (1082 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A man who sexually abused two young girls at a home-based daycare has been sentenced to 12 years in prison.

Robert Prince, 37, pleaded guilty last March to two counts of sexual interference, two counts of making child pornography and one count of possession of child pornography.

Prince abused the girls — then five and eight — when his wife, who operated the daycare, was out of the house.

“The two mothers are living their worst nightmares,” provincial court Judge Victoria Cornick said at a sentencing hearing last month. “They left their children with someone who would harm them. The disruption and devastation to these victims and their families is ongoing and may never be fully resolved.”

Prince came to the attention of police after the discovery of a child sex-abuse video he posted to Facebook in April 2021, according to an agreed statement of facts provided to court.

Winnipeg police charged Prince with distributing child pornography in January 2022 and seized his cellphone. A subsequent analysis of the phone uncovered 158 child sex-abuse images and five videos, involving girls between the ages of two and 12; 15 of the images depicted two girls who attended the daycare.

Pictures included an image of Prince sexually abusing one of the girls and pictures of the second girl in graphic sexual poses.

In an interview with police last year, one of the victims said Prince abused her on six occasions when they were alone together at the daycare.

The girl said on one occasion she had been sleeping and woke up to Prince “humping” her. On another, he made her kiss him in exchange for candy, she said.

A pre-sentence report provided to court said Prince told a probation officer he “took advantage of a situation (he) shouldn’t have,” and rationalized his offending against one victim, saying: “I didn’t want to force her if she didn’t want to.”

“This was a veiled and weak attempt to rationalize his criminal behaviour,” Cornick said. “His suggestion there was any degree of victim participation is an absolute failure to recognize the level of grooming, coercion and manipulation he exercised over extremely young and vulnerable children.”

The mothers of both girls provided victim impact statements to court detailing their anguish and sense of betrayal, with one noting her daughter referred to Prince affectionately as “uncle.” Both girls are in therapy.

Prince, according to a pre-sentence report, said he knew what he was doing was wrong, and wanted help, but feared disclosing what he did to anyone would inevitably lead to his arrest.

“I cannot accept that the only alternatives Mr. Prince was left with was to continue victimizing the children or turn himself in by seeking help,” Cornick said.

“The options between these two extremes may not have been easy or convenient, but they would have spared the two victims the harm done,” she said. “It appears if the solution was not blameless, convenient or easy, Mr. Prince was not interested in it.”

Prince received credit for time served, reducing his remaining sentence to just under 10 years.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca