David Murray, convicted of sexual assault
Pitt Meadows city councillor, David Murray, will be back before PoCo provincial court Judge Deirdre Pothecary on Jan. 10, 2018, to fix a date for sentencing after being convicted of sexual assault on Wednesday.
Last November, Murray was charged with one count of sexual assault and one count of sexual interference with a person under the age of 14 for an offence alleged to have happened in 1992 at a PoCo business where he was the accuser's boss.
Murray denied the allegations made by a former employee, who cannot be identified under a court publication order; she reported the offence to RCMP in 2015.
Dan McLaughlin, communications counsel for the BC Prosecution Service, told The Tri-City News that the sexual interference charge was previously stayed by the Crown.
"As the matter is still before the court, the BC Prosecution Service will not be commenting further on the circumstances of the offence, the offender or the position it will be taking in any future related proceedings," he said in an email.
Murray also works in PoCo as a city parks worker, and took a temporary leave from this position last December, returning to work in February of this year. Pardeep Purewal, the city of PoCo's communications manager states that "as a precaution, [Murray] was assigned to a variety of non-public facing duties at the public works yard (i.e., garbage and recycling cart maintenance, works yard clean up, equipment clean up/maintenance, vegetation and grounds maintenance) where he continued to work until Oct. 2," she said in an emailed statement.
The now-convicted sex offender has also served on the executive committees of the Pitt Meadows Soccer Club and the Ridge Meadows Minor Baseball Association, and has coached high school basketball for more than 30 years, including at PoCo's Terry Fox secondary school.
Murray was elected to Pitt Meadows council in 2011, and is being urged by other members of council to step down from his position there. He has so far not indicated that he plans to do so.
What this publication finds extremely problematic is that there is no mechanism in place with which to ban Mr Murray from resuming his duties on council. As Global News pointed out, .
The maximum sentence for sexual assault in this province is 10 years in jail. Perhaps Mr Murray will be Skyped in to Pitt Meadows city council meetings from Oakalla prison? Or should the municipality perhaps put some checks and balances in place to hold their elected to account should one of them sexually assault a minor again in the future?
With files from Janis Cleugh,
