Revenge porn lawsuit underway in Brandon

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This article was published 09/02/2021 (1865 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BRANDON — Brittany Roque says her life was thrown into disarray, after intimate images of her were distributed to a potential employer while she was applying to become a Brandon Police Service officer in 2017.

Monday marked the first day of a civil lawsuit in the Court of Queen’s Bench against the woman who leaked her nude photos to members of the BPS executive during the hiring process. The City of Brandon is listed as a third party in the lawsuit.

According to an agreed statement of fact, the plaintiff took and sent intimate photos of herself to a BPS officer during a three-month affair in 2015, under the pretense he would not share the photos and would destroy them if the relationship ended.

Ryan Friesen forwarded the images to his email account before deleting them from his cellphone. He did this so his then-partner, defendant Terry Lynn Peters, wouldn’t find them.

In May 2016, Roque applied to become a police officer with the BPS; in August, she was shortlisted, which she said Monday excited her.

In January 2017, Friesen attempted to delete the intimate images from his email account. He told Peters his email password, so she could search the account for evidence of infidelity.

On Feb 19, 2017, Peters found nude images of Roque in the trash folder, along with photos of other women. She sent copies to her own email and confronted her partner.

A few days later, Peters distributed images of Roque to BPS senior executive, while she was still in the middle of the hiring competition to become a police officer.

In March 2017, Roque underwent a polygraph test as part of the hiring process, where she disclosed her past relationship with the police officer.

At the end of the meeting, she was told she could either withdraw from the hiring process or else she would be removed by the BPS, according to the agreed statement of fact.

She didn’t withdraw; and then filed complaints over what happened with the Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba and the RCMP.

During her testimony Monday via an online video platform, Roque told Kevin Toyne, her lawyer, she was under the impression the images she sent to Friesen were private and he was permanently deleting them.

Roque said she was shocked and confused when she found out Brandon police had them and didn’t previously tell her.

She told the court Peters distributing the images without her consent set off a chain reaction in her life and caused an “extreme amount” of fear. At one point, she didn’t sleep for 36 hours and lost 15 pounds as a result, she said.

The incident embarrassed and humiliated her, Roque testified, and she had constant thoughts about how it could affect her or her children’s futures.

At one point, she contemplated suicide, but thoughts of her family kept her alive.

“That was the moment I realized I didn’t want to die… I wanted it to stop, I wanted it to stop consuming my life and having to constantly live in this fear… It was just a dark moment,” Roque said through tears.

Under cross-examination from the defendant’s lawyer, Rhea Majewski, Roque said was able to maintain her job and relationship throughout the incident, but only with professional counselling.

She also agreed she didn’t expressly tell Friesen the photos were only meant for him.

The trial is to continue today.

— Brandon Sun