| Alberta Justice has dropped the charges laid against four men following a controversial raid on a gay bathhouse in Calgary in December 2002.
Crown prosecutor David Torske says the charges were dropped because the Crown couldn’t prove that the sexual activity police observed in Goliath’s Saunatel was contrary to Calgarians’ standards of tolerance.
Goliath’s Saunatel owner Darrell Zakreski, manager Lonnie Nomeland and employees Peter Jackson and Gerald Rider were charged with being keepers of a common bawdyhouse.
None of the accused appeared in court when the charges were stayed. However, defence lawyer John Bascom says the two years of legal wrangling have been emotionally trying for his clients.
"These are individuals who have never been involved with the law previously. They were arrested, brought before the courts… it was a great deal of stress and they’re quite relieved it’s all over," he says.
Bascom says he’s hopeful that the stay of charges will prevent future bathhouse raids and charges being laid.
"I would hope that this particular activity by the police would not occur in the future…. Whatever happens between consenting adults is their business."
Police officers testified earlier in the trial that they launched an undercover investigation at the bathhouse after receiving information from two sources. One anonymous source said he was interested in starting up a bathhouse of his own, but he questioned whether the activity he’d observed in Goliath’s was legal. The other source was a teen prostitute who claimed he’d been paid for sex at Goliath’s. He died in a car accident in 2003 and therefore wasn’t able to testify.
The undercover police investigation did not reveal any evidence of prostitution. Officers testified they’d seen men masturbating in the open, and in one case, they observed one man masturbating himself and another man.
Crown prosecutor David Torske says the court case dragged on for two years because such a case hasn’t been tried in Alberta since the 1980s, and the Crown and defence had to determine how societal attitudes have changed in that time.
Torkse says in a survey of Calgarians conducted by University of Calgary PhD anthropology student Bruce Freeman, which was submitted as evidence by the defence, 55 per cent of respondents "indicated they would tolerate this sort of facility in their community."
Torske says that even though the Crown did drop the charges, that doesn’t mean Alberta Justice would never prosecute such a case again. And he also says police did nothing wrong during their investigation.
"I don’t think you can come to the conclusion that this has anything to do with the failings in the investigation by the police," says Torske. "This decision does not reflect that Alberta Justice will not look at prosecuting similar cases in the future. We won’t speculate on that."
Terry Haldane, who was initially charged with being a "found-in" at the bathhouse during the 2002 raid, but had previously had the charge dropped as well, says a lot of time and money was wasted prosecuting people for sexual activity occurring between consenting adults in what he considers a private place.
"I don’t believe the case had any merit from the beginning and the police knew that," says Haldane. "It’s very difficult to respect a police service that does this sort of thing… the relationship between the police service and the community is down the tubes and that’s a result of… the raid that they did." |
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