An Ontario judge has sentenced an Iraqi Uber driver to ten months in jail for sexually assaulting his passenger who was just looking for a ride home from a party.
The Ontario Court of Justice heard a woman engaged Sevan Halabi’s services as an Uber driver on Oct. 9, 2022. Halabi, who is a permanent resident of Canada, was angling for a lighter sentence to avoid deportation.
“She wanted him to drive her home from a party she’d attended. Rather than take her home, the offender drove her to an empty parking lot,” Justice Scott Pratt wrote in a recent decision out of Windsor.
“He told her they would have fun. He parked the car and got into the back seat. He moved closer to the victim and forcibly kissed her. He put his hand under her dress and touched her vaginal area over her underwear.”
Halabi ignored the woman’s protests, Pratt said.
“After he tried again to kiss her and she did not respond, he moved away from her,” said the judge.
“She asked if he would still drive her home and he said no. She got out of the car, and he left her in the parking lot.”
The married father of two had asked the judge for a sentence of six months less a day to avoid immigration consequences.
“I am not unsympathetic to the offender’s family,” Pratt said in a decision dated April 3.
“In my view, however, a sentence of six months less a day for this conduct would be unfit. It would prioritize the offender’s personal circumstances over the need to denounce and deter his conduct and would not be in line with relevant case law. It would be an inappropriate and artificial sentence imposed only to avoid legitimate consequences created by Parliament.”
According to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, permanent residents can be deemed “inadmissible” to Canada for “serious criminality” if they’re sentenced to more than six months in jail.
But six months less a day plus probation — the sentence Halabi’s lawyer argued unsuccessfully for — doesn’t reflect the seriousness of his actions, Pratt said.
“It would require me to cut the sentence nearly in half, solely to assist him in avoiding future penalties,” said the judge. “I cannot do that.”
In laying out the reasons for his sentence, the judge referred to other similar cases from the recent past.
“It is troubling that sexual offences committed by professional drivers are sufficiently common that they have created their own body of case law,” Pratt said. “But that is what has happened.”
The Crown argued Halabi should get a year in jail, followed by three years of probation.
Halabi was born in Iraq.
“He married his spouse in 2009, said the judge. “They have two sons, aged 10 and 14.”
They immigrated to Canada in 2018.
“His wife and children have since become Canadian citizens, but (Halabi) remains a permanent resident,” Pratt said.
“In submissions, the offender’s counsel advised he was unable to apply for citizenship because of the charge before this court.”
Halabi maintained his innocence to the author of a pre-sentence report.
But he told the judge “he regrets what happened, has learned a lesson, and that this will not happen again,” said the decision.
“I don’t know what happened between the (pre-sentence report) interview and the present, but to me the offender has now expressed remorse,” Pratt said. “I have no reason to doubt his sincerity, but it is a marked change from a report dated (Feb. 5).”
The victim read a statement in court.
“It reveals the ongoing and pervasive impact the offence has had on her,” said the judge. “She still suffers from panic attacks and flashbacks. The offence has hindered her professional life as a teacher and her personal life as well. She is fearful and angry. She didn’t know if she would be raped or killed (in Halabi’s car that night), and that fear continues to impact her life.”
Halabi has “shown some degree of remorse,” Pratt said. “He said he regrets what happened and that he has learned his lesson. It’s not clear, however, if that regret stems from his actions or from the consequences he has brought on his family.”
Halabi’s children were in court for the sentencing submissions.
“On that point, both children were visibly upset and crying during the proceeding,” Pratt said. “Respectfully, I question why they were here in the first place. It was not a case where their father was in custody and so this would have been a rare opportunity to see him in person; (Halabi) has been out of custody throughout this case and only appeared virtually from Iraq. I cannot find they were brought into the courtroom to engender sympathy from the court but given the offender’s focus on how my sentence could affect his family, that is certainly an inference available to be drawn.”
Pratt saw Halabi’s “very significant” breach of trust as an aggravating factor in the case.
“The entire business model of Uber and similar companies is to contact a stranger over the internet so you can get in their car,” said the judge. “It goes against everything we are taught and everything we teach about staying safe. As a result, the trust we necessarily place in these drivers is enormous. When that trust is broken with criminal actions, courts must respond harshly.”
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