R. v. Knight, 2024 BCCA 394, November 15, 2024, at paragraphs 24 to 26:
On the issue of childhood sexual victimization, the judge was alive to this aspect of the appellant’s background. See paras. 19–24 of her reasons for sentence. She understood that his personal circumstances were relevant to her proportionality analysis: at para. 55. It is well-established that for purposes of appellate review, reasons for judgment are read as a whole and in the context of the record. In my view, there is no principled basis on which to find that the judge did not take the appellant’s childhood struggles into account in determining a fit sentence.
Moreover, as the Crown correctly noted in its material, there was no evidence of a contributory link between the appellant’s childhood sexual victimization and his offending, such that this aspect of the case could properly attenuate his moral culpability or otherwise attract significant weight in the proportionality analysis. For example, there was no evidence that childhood trauma had normalized sexual abuse for the appellant in a manner that affected his ability to appreciate the harm he could cause through sexual interaction with someone under the age of 16: R. v. C.K., 2023 BCCA 468 at paras. 86–88; R. v. Hurley, 2024 BCCA 259 at paras. 26–29.
In the absence of a demonstrated contributory link, the judge was not bound to approach or assess this factor in a particular way. The appellant says that in light of the recognized long-term harms of child sexual abuse detailed in Friesen, a sentencing judge should assume a nexus between an offender’s childhood victimization and their offending. However, this position fails to account for the analytical approach to the issue that is set out in Hurley and other cases and is binding upon us. Nor does it recognize that in Friesen, the Supreme Court noted that children who experience sexual violence “… may be more prone to engage in sexual violence against children themselves when they reach adulthood …”: at para. 81, emphasis added, internal reference omitted. Thus, an individualized assessment is required, based on the evidentiary foundation available at sentencing.
