The Crown says Yaremko should receive an indeterminate dangerous offender sentence. The defence wants 15 years with 10 years of supervision.
Joseph Simon Peter Yaremko has shown a pattern of persistent, aggressive and violent behaviour that cannot be managed, treated or controlled in the community, a Saskatoon King’s Bench courtroom heard on Friday.
Making his closing arguments at Yaremko’s dangerous offender hearing, Crown prosecutor Lee Hnatiuk said Yaremko poses a significant risk to the public, meets all the criteria for a dangerous offender designation and should be held in custody for an indeterminate amount of time.
Defence lawyer Evan Strelioff argued his client should receive a fixed sentence of 15 years followed by a 10-year long-term supervision order that would have Yaremko monitored in the community well into his 60s.
Court heard Yaremko pushed his way into a 21-year-old woman’s Stonebridge neighbourhood condo in 2019, trapped her inside, forced her at knifepoint to use drugs and watch pornography and raped her before she escaped two days later.
While he was awaiting trial, Yaremko trapped and attacked an employee at Saskatoon’s Regional Psychiatric Centre in a shoe room after giving her a graphic, sexual letter that was later found ripped up in jug of cleaning solution. He received a three-year sentence.
Strelioff said the three incidents are insufficient in establishing the required pattern for a dangerous offender designation. Justice Daryl Labach suggested Yaremko’s 110 prior convictions would be enough, but Strelioff said most of them don’t involve aggressive behaviour.
The officers were able to stop the truck in the 2014 incident, but it was “by the grace of God” that the truck didn’t go off the overpass, Labach said on Friday. He noted that one of Yaremko’s assaults was in an institution, while the other was “unfathomable” — the kind of thing people have nightmares about.
“Isn’t the real problem that he thinks he knows what’s best for himself, and he won’t take the treatment that he requires so he can walk freely among us?” Labach asked.
Strelioff said Yaremko’s substance abuse has consumed his life and driven his offending, but his cravings have diminished since he started getting medical injections in jail. He’s motivated to continue this treatment, and can be monitored in the community at some point under strict conditions, he told court, arguing that Yaremko was able to control his sexual impulses for decades.
“His worst days are behind him,” Strelioff said, noting Yaremko is “aging out” of the criminal justice system.
Hnatiuk said Yaremko “employs manipulation and violence” to get what he wants, and doesn’t care who he hurts. Treatment won’t help his impulsivity, as he’s proven he’s not willing and has no interest in trying to reduce his risk by staying sober, Hnatiuk concluded.
Dangerous offender hearings establish whether an offender’s pattern of violent or sexual behaviour poses a risk that can’t be managed in the community. Determinate sentences are followed by long-term supervision orders to protect the public.
Offenders who receive indeterminate sentences can apply for parole after seven years. Labach said the likelihood of parole is low because the Correctional Service of Canada doesn’t have the necessary infrastructure — and the public doesn’t have the appetite — to rehabilitate dangerous offenders serving indeterminate sentences.
Hnatiuk said programming is still available to dangerous offenders, and it’s up to them to do the work to justify their release. Labach said it’s a different story when offenders want to change, but aren’t given the resources.
In Canada, we don’t “throw away the key” on people; we try to rehabilitate them, he noted.
At his 2015 sentencing, Yaremko’s lawyer said his client was trying to turn his life around through mental health and addictions programming, but the judge doubted his intentions to rehabilitate based on his criminal history.
Speaking from the prisoner’s box, Yaremko apologized to the victim’s family, his family and the community.
Labach reserved his decision until Dec. 13.
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