Judge rejects ‘similar fact’ application in firefighter’s trial

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This article was published 01/06/2020 (1965 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Two alleged victims, each described as vulnerable and each of whom met their accused attacker through martial arts classes.

But those and other similarities in the cases of two women allegedly assaulted by firefighter and martial arts instructor Manuel Ruiz weren’t enough to convince a judge she should use the evidence of one woman to corroborate the evidence of the other.

“This type of evidence is only accepted in exceptional circumstances,” Justice Joan McKelvey ruled Monday, rejecting a “similar fact” application by Crown prosecutor Michelle Bright.

McKelvey said there were enough dissimilarities between the two women’s allegations that the “prejudicial effect outweighs the probative value of this evidence.”

Ruiz, 54, is on trial charged with nine offences, including sexual assault, uttering threats, and forcible entry dating back more than 20 years.

Court heard testimony last week one alleged victim first met Ruiz in 1986 when she was 12 and they were attending the same taekwondo studio. The second woman, now 35, met Ruiz when she was turning 18 and taking classes at his Sherbrook Avenue jiu-jitsu studio.

Both women testified when they were adults, Ruiz would go on to force sex on them against their will, intimidating them into silence and ignoring their pleas to stop.

“There are distinctions and similarities which the Crown says cannot be coincidences,” Bright said. “There are similarities in their evidence that do show a pattern of behaviour on the part of the accused.

Bright said acceptance of the similar fact application would allow the Crown to show Ruiz employed a “modus operandi” in exploiting the alleged victims, and assist the court in assessing their credibility.

“The similar fact evidence establishes that the accused uses a specific system or modus operandi in committing the assaults and creating opportunities for the assaults to be committed,” she said.

“The Crown says he did this by forming relationships with them in which he was the one with all the power… They felt intimidated by him, afraid of him, and physically threatened by him, and as a result, they did not resist when he forced intercourse on them without their consent.”

Defence lawyer Matt Gould argued the alleged use of power and control over the victims was not distinctive enough a factor to support a similar fact application.

“Every offence of sexual assault involves exerting power and control,” he said. “If that weren’t present, there wouldn’t be an allegation in the first place.”

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Gould said the reliability of one woman’s evidence was so severely compromised that a similar fact finding would be impossible.

That woman testified she had lived with Ruiz for several months just a short time after meeting him, but under cross examination insisted she had in fact moved in with Ruiz three years later. The woman told court years of substance abuse had left her memory “foggy.”

The defence opened its case Monday afternoon, with Gould questioning Ruiz for over 90 minutes about his work, home and martial arts history, setting out a timeline expected to refute the allegations of his accusers.

Ruiz will resume his testimony Tuesday morning.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca

Dean Pritchard
Courts reporter

Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean.

Every piece of reporting Dean produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.