Bail bid denied for man who sexually exploited girls

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This article was published 10/07/2018 (2873 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A 55-year-old Winnipeg man who admitted he regularly picked up underage Indigenous girls from their group homes to have sex with them made an unusual attempt to be released from jail on Tuesday.

Eric Gudmandson is in custody awaiting his sentence, after he pleaded guilty last fall to several charges of obtaining sexual services from seven girls who were all between the ages of 12 and 17, and were all either in the care of Child and Family Services (CFS) or wards of CFS. All but one of the girls had been repeatedly abused by Gudmandson, who traded them combinations of cash, marijuana, alcohol, tobacco and prescription drugs for sex.

Provincial court Judge Cynthia Devine denied his bail request on Tuesday — a rare task for a judge who had already heard the accused apologize for his crimes at a sentencing hearing.

While details of Gudmandson’s bail hearing are covered under a court-ordered publication ban, details of his sexual offences against the underage girls became part of the public record during his sentencing hearing in December. At the time, Gudmandson read from a handwritten letter, telling Devine he felt shame and regret, and said he suffered from a sex addiction.

The judge heard about the circumstances of the young girls, who were described as some of the most vulnerable children. One of them had come to the city for therapy after a suicide attempt and ran away from her family.

“She was easy prey for this predator,” Crown attorney Alanna Hall said of Gudmandson at his sentencing hearing.

In a handwritten statement of her own, one of the girls expressed how she had never been into drugs and never thought of “selling myself” until Gudmandson came into her life and sent her “downhill.” Another girl, who felt she had nowhere safe to go, described how Gudmandson would promise to let her stay the night at his apartment if she had sex with him.

A sentencing date has not yet been set, but the Crown is seeking an 11-year prison sentence.

Gudmandson’s former defence lawyer, who stopped representing him prior to his bail request on Tuesday, was seeking a significantly lower sentence with a lengthy period of probation, arguing Gudmandson’s cancer diagnosis and treatment left him exhausted and without the sexual urges he once had.

The recovering alcoholic was diagnosed with throat cancer after he was arrested.

Police started investigating Gudmandson after being tipped off by CFS agencies which had heard about him from several girls.

He was arrested in July 2016, after police searched his Spence Street basement apartment. Many of the girls were able to describe, in detail, the layout of his suite and the dresser where he kept marijuana. His two sons were often home, and some of the girls knew them by name. The oldest son referred to them as his father’s “whores.”

Gudmandson would communicate with the girls on Facebook and pick them up at their respective group homes, and was often introduced to a victim through his previous victims. He got to know one of the girls through her mother, who was a sex worker.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @thatkatiemay