MANDEL: Jacob Hoggard finally singing those jailhouse blues

The Hedley frontman was found guilty in June 2022 and later sentenced to five years behind bars.

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Michele Mandel
Published Aug 16, 2024  •  Last updated Aug 16, 2024  •  3 minute read
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Jacob Hoggard is pictured.
Jacob Hoggard is pictured. Photo by Tijana Martin /The Canadian Press

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

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Convicted rapist Jacob Hoggard is finally beginning to serve his five-year sentence for sexual assault causing bodily harm.

And justice has come at last for the Ottawa woman he so violently attacked and then discarded, leaving her a shadow of the happy person she used to be. Now it’s the disgraced former frontman of Hedley who will learn the terror and pain of losing all control over your life.

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In a decision released Friday, Ontario’s top court dismissed Hoggard’s appeal despite finding it was a mistake to include the evidence of Dr. Lori Haskell, the Crown’s first witness and an expert on the neurobiology of trauma. The complainant had chances to escape or call for help and the psychologist had been asked to give a generic “science lesson” to combat rape myths that there is only one way a “real” victim would react.
The Ontario Court of Appeal said Superior Court Justice Gillian Roberts could have done that with her instructions to the jury and there was no need to take a chance of confusing jurors with an expert. But the court found the judge went on to minimize the mistake.
When the jury wanted a readback of her evidence, the judge refused and reminded them that it was not to be used to decide the particulars of this case. They then spent another five days deliberating before finding Hoggard guilty on one count, and not guilty on the other.
“I have concluded that the trial judge erred by admitting the expert testimony. However, in response to the jury’s questions, the trial judge corrected any misuse of the evidence and in light of all the circumstances, there was no substantial wrong or miscarriage of justice,” said Justice Mary Lou Benotto on behalf of the three-judge panel.
His defence team said they were disappointed with the decision.
“While we maintain that Mr. Hoggard’s trial was unfair, we respect the court’s decision. We are carefully reviewing the judgment to consider our next steps,” they said in a released statement.
Hoggard’s victim has waited eight long years for this day.
In 2016, the 22-year-old Ottawa woman had met the singer over Tinder and agreed to hook up with him at a Toronto hotel — but the encounter turned ugly and violent. He suddenly turned into a monster, she testified, ignored her cries to stop and choked her, spit in her mouth, slapped her across the face and viciously assaulted her over and over again.
“A part of me died that day that I will never get back,” she later told him in her fierce victim impact statement  “My life as I knew it was stolen from me and shattered beyond recognition. The assault took away my worth, my privacy, my body, my confidence and my voice.“
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And then she was victimized a second time during her rapist’s trial in 2022, forced to recount the most painful and humiliating time of her life in front of a room full of strangers and then mercilessly grilled for days and ambushed with a phone call Hoggard had recorded that she didn’t remember. After six days of deliberation, the jury found Hoggard guilty of sexual assault causing bodily harm but acquitted him of similar charges related to a teenaged fan.

The judge said she would have sentenced to the term the Crown had suggested — six to seven years — but for the multimillion dollar lawsuit his victim had filed against him. He’s been free on bail pending his appeal.

Now the father and singer-turned-Vancouver carpenter will begin serving his prison sentence while facing another trial in the fall related to a third complainant in Kirkland Lake, Ont.

But as his victim quoted back the same cold words he used as he raped her over and over again; “Don’t worry, it will be over soon.”

mmandel@postmedia.com

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