Royal Newfoundland Constabulary Const. Carl Douglas Snelgrove arrives at the provincial Supreme Court building in St. John's on Saturday, May 15, 2021. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sarah Smellie
ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – The Supreme Court of Canada will not hear an appeal from a Newfoundland police officer convicted of a 2014 sexual assault.
The decision today from the country’s highest court closes Royal Newfoundland Constabulary officer Carl Douglas Snelgrove’s last avenue of appeal and clears the way for him to serve his prison sentence.
The case has gripped the province since it first began in 2017, with Snelgrove’s victim forced to testify in three separate trials about the night he raped her in her living room.
A jury found Snelgrove guilty in provincial Supreme Court in 2021 following a mistrial the year before and a successful appeal of an acquittal in 2017.
He was sentenced to four years in jail but has been out on bail pending today’s decision.
The court heard Snelgrove was on duty when he drove the woman home from a night out with friends in downtown St. John’s and then helped her get into her apartment when she couldn’t find her keys.
More coming.
