By Chelsea Laskowski

Man sentenced to 4 years after unknowingly having sex with minor

Jun 2, 2014 | 11:45 AM

Legally, a 13-year-old can't give consent to have sex with an adult.

But when a girl told a man she was 23 in early 2012, it ended in a list of serious charges against Aaron Rabbitskin, then 28 years old.

Among them were sexual assault and the production of child pornography charges.

Valerie Harvey, who represented Rabbitskin after preliminary court proceedings, described the circumstances of that night.

“It was just a really unfortunate turn of events … She was certainly the one who initiated the sexual contact, no question about it. But Aaron, he didn’t exercise due diligence in making sure that that’s how old she was,” Harvey said.

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By the end of this May, Rabbitskin had served over two years in custody in Prince Albert.

On May 23, he entered a guilty plea to the sexual assault and child pornography charges.

“The Crown [prosecutor], at the outset, for the longest time, had taken the position that six years was appropriate. When the file came to me I researched and found that they were way outside the range. So then it was a matter of negotiating with the Crown to find a realistic number,” Harvey said.

“In my research, I never found anything that would have been identical to this,” she added. However, “you cobble together the cases you can that approximates the situation you have.”

That’s what led Harvey and the Crown prosecutor to a joint submission requesting a four-year sentence for Rabbitskin.

Three of those were for the assault, and one for the child pornography.

He received 40.5 months credit for his time spent in remand, and will likely spend the remaining seven and a half months in a correctional centre in Prince Albert, Harvey explained.

Once he gets out of prison, Rabbitskin will also be on the sex offender registry for life, receive a firearm prohibition, and have a DNA sample ordered.

Due to the youth’s age, nothing that can identify her can be published.

claskowski@panow.com

On Twitter: @chelsealaskowsk