Former classmate of alleged sexual assault victim says the woman expressed desire to have sex with teacher Jason Selby
The woman accusing former Calgary teacher Jason Selby of sexual abuse proclaimed an intention to sleep with him, a former classmate testified Tuesday.
The witness, who came forward after reading an online report of Selby’s Calgary Court of Justice trial, said she felt compelled to contact his lawyer with what she considered “missing information.”
She told defence counsel Alain Hepner she had a brief conversation with the complainant following an end-of-year school exam.
“She said she was trying to get the teacher to sleep with her,” the witness said.
She said the complainant then walked up to Selby and spoke with him.
“She didn’t say Mr. Selby (was her sexual target) but it was clear who she was speaking to.”
The complainant, who can’t be identified, testified Monday she has no recollection of the conversation and was not close friends with her ex-classmate.
Selby is accused of sexually exploiting the complainant, now 23, when she was still 17 following her high school graduation in June, 2018.
Under cross-examination, Crown prosecutor Pam McCluskey questioned how the witness came to contact the defence lawyer.
She said she was at school in Europe and during a group chat with some of her former classmates someone sent her a copy of an article covering Selby’s trial.
In the group conversation, they had discussed their belief it was the alleged victim who had filed a complaint against Selby.
“It was more gossip than anything,” she said.
She told McCluskey that none of them actually knew the complainant had engaged in a lengthy sexual relationship with Selby for nearly two years.
“You felt it was unfair to Mr. Selby,” McCluskey asked, about her former teacher’s prosecution.
“I felt like it was missing information.”
Meanwhile, Hepner called a former colleague of Selby’s to describe an incident the witness believes involved the complainant early in the 2017-18 school years.
Retired teacher Rick Patterson said early one morning in September, mid-week, a female student entered a classroom where he and Selby were playing guitar, plopped into a desk and indicated she was exhausted from partying.
“She said words to the effect of … ‘since I’ve turned 18 I’ve been partying a little,’” Patterson said.
“The phrase ‘turned 18’ stuck.”
He said he later learned it was the complainant.
But under cross-examination he told McCluskey it took a conversation with Selby more than four years after the fact to jog his memory.
“He (Selby) said something along the lines of ‘do you remember a conversation’ and I said ‘yes I do,’” Patterson said.
Selby started having sex with the student about a week after the end of school and before her 18th birthday.
Justice Sean Dunnigan will begin to hear final submissions on Wednesday.