A judge has found a Saskatchewan woman guilty of unlawful confinement for allowing her spouse to lock their five children in rooms without doorknobs — sometimes for up to 15 hours at a time.
Her children were between three and 10 years old when they were kept in rooms without knowing how to get out, Justice Krista Zerr ruled in August, finding the woman guilty of five counts of being a party to unlawful confinement following a trial in Battleford Court of Queen’s Bench.
“There were times the children tried to get out, but were unable to do so,” Zerr found, dismissing the mother’s claim that her children knew how to open the door using their finger or a butter knife.
A publication ban prevents the reporting of the woman’s name in order to protect the identities of her children, who were removed from her and her spouse’s care in 2014 and again in the summer of 2016 while the family lived in northwest Saskatchewan.
The children’s father was sentenced to two years less a day in 2019 after pleading guilty to forcible confinement and failure to provide the necessaries of life.
The woman’s trial heard that her spouse’s mother reported the couple to social services in July 2016 — when the missing doorknobs were first observed.
The children were apprehended a month later after their father refused to either reinstall the knobs or remove the bedroom doors, according to the written decision.
The woman told social workers and police that some doorknobs were removed to prevent her kids from roaming at night, and that other knobs were broken.
Family members, social workers and the oldest child testified the children had been urinating and defecating in their rooms. Witnesses reported both the rooms and the children smelled overwhelmingly of urine; one social worker described how the children peed on the floor of the ministry’s office after they were apprehended, despite being offered a bathroom.
The oldest child said she was usually put to bed around 6 p.m. and not let out of her room until 9 a.m. She said besides school, they were allowed out for two hours and if they needed to use the washroom, they went on the floor of their rooms.
Zerr found although the woman worked nights, she was fully aware that her spouse was locking the kids in their rooms for extended periods of time.
“When she left the house, she knew what was about to occur. She did not alter her routine, nor did she take a single step to prevent (her spouse’s) continued acts of unlawful confinement. After the fact, she rationalized and defended the practice,” Zerr concluded.
She acquitted the woman of five counts of failing to provide the necessaries of life and four counts of being a party to the offence of assault causing bodily harm.
A sentencing hearing is scheduled for Oct. 13 in Battleford.
Copyright Postmedia Network Inc., 2020
