CONTROL AND POWER: Seven women testified against alleged serial rapist from Kamloops | iNFOnews

June 13, 2024 – 6:00 p.m.

NOTE ON CONTENT

The jury in the trial of an alleged serial rapist in Kamloops has not yet returned to the courtroom after hearing the Crown’s final witness this week.

Joel Eric Carlson is on trial for nine counts of sexual harassment against seven different women, more than five years after the last alleged incident. Some, but not all, were ex-girlfriends and at least one more was a friend with whom they had agreed not to have a relationship.

Each of the plaintiffs tells their story differently. The first statement last week came from a woman who said she would have consented to sex only if he had used a condom. When he didn’t, she tried to fight him off and the assault escalated.

Additional witnesses testified before the jury in Kamloops this week. The names of all plaintiffs and details that could identify them are protected by publication bans.

On Tuesday, June 11, a woman said Carlson raped her three times in three months. The first time was just weeks after she broke up with him.

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She was one of the plaintiffs who told the jury they came forward after seeing news reports about Carlson four years ago.

Each time he showed up at her apartment unannounced by climbing onto her balcony, she said. She found him outside those three times and he appeared to be drunk. She let him stay on the condition that he slept on the couch.

“If someone is drunk, I’m more likely to let them in so they don’t drive home,” she said when prosecutor Katie Bouchard asked her why she let Carlson in.

The woman also said she didn’t want to make a scene outside. Both reasons played a role in why she let him in all three times.

Each time, he would reject the couch and go to her bed, wherever she went.

“I felt disrespected because I let you into my house and you didn’t listen to my offer,” she said.

Then he held her down and forced himself on her. The first time, she resisted for about ten minutes before giving up because she couldn’t overpower him, she said.

“I said no, leave me alone,” she said. “It was almost like I was egging him on. Like he wanted to prove something… that he had control and power over me.”

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Bouchard asked how she felt about the alleged rape in her own home.

“As if the security of my own home had been taken away from me. And as if I had been violated in what should have been my own safe place,” she said.

The evening went similarly the next time, but this time she only tried to fight him off for two minutes, but this time she failed, she said. Then she slept on the couch.

The third time, however, she managed to break free after screaming and spitting in Carlson’s face. She said she screamed louder than she ever had in her life, but it was the spit that startled him and loosened his grip on her arms. She ran into the kitchen and grabbed a frying pan for protection, she said.

This time he left the apartment instead of sleeping in her bed.

A neighbor heard her screams and called the police, but she didn’t tell them what happened when they came to the door.

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“I think I was ashamed that I even let it happen, and besides, you hope that the first time will be the only time. I wanted to put it behind me and have no more contact with him,” she said.

Carlson kept his eyes forward during her testimony. He did not appear to react during her testimony, except to occasionally take notes.

On Monday, June 10, another plaintiff told the jury that Carlson raped her after the two went to a bar after they both came to the conclusion that they would remain friends and not enter into a relationship.

She met Carlson after work and went with him and some of his friends to The Duchess, a former strip club in Kamloops. She only finished part of her drink when she felt uncomfortable and much drunker than she expected.

The woman, who suspected she had been drugged, was invited to Carlson’s house to sleep over. Her memory was vague, but she remembered that his mother was in the house when she got there.

She told the jury that she had no desire or expectation to have sex with Carlson because she wanted to remain friends with him.

She thought she was going to sleep on the couch, but instead she was in bed with Carlson while his mother was on the couch in the basement. She remembered Carlson kissing her and that she didn’t want to do that, but she couldn’t resist because she was so drunk.

In the morning she woke up with a vaginal tear, which she said was not unusual even after consensual sexual intercourse.

The jury heard that she could not be sure who had slipped something into her drink and that she did not claim it was Carlson.

The two women testifying here are among seven plaintiffs against Carlson, each of whom has a different account of the sexual harassment they allegedly suffered at his hands.

After a week and a half, the prosecution has presented all the evidence to the jury, but it is not yet clear whether Carlson will present evidence and how long the trial will last.

NOTE TO READERS: If you need assistance, please contact one of these organizations. Help is available 24/7 at any of these phone numbers:

• 
  VictimLinkBC: 1-800-563-0808
• 
  Vancouver Rape Relief Crisis Hotline: 604-872-8212
• 
  Kamloops Sexual Assault Counselling Centre Crisis Hotline: 1-888-974-7278

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