Women win lawsuit against Ivan Henry, the B.C. man who was acquitted of sexually assaulting them

A man who spent 27 years in prison before he was found to have been wrongfully convicted has been ordered by a British Columbia Supreme Court judge to pay $375,000 each to five women who sued him for sexual assault.

Ivan Henry was convicted of 10 counts of sexual assault in 1983, but he was released when the B.C. Court of Appeal acquitted him in 2010 after determining he had been wrongfully convicted.

Henry represented himself at his trial in 1983, and he was given an indefinite sentence as a dangerous offender, but he was released and later awarded $8 million in his own civil lawsuit against the City of Vancouver and the provincial and federal governments. 

Five women later filed a civil lawsuit against Henry, maintaining that despite the convictions being overturned, he was the man who sexually assaulted them in their Vancouver homes in the early 1980s. 

The plaintiffs are identified in the ruling by their initials, with descriptions of their sexual assaults in their ground-floor or basement suites between May 1981 and June 1982.

Justice Miriam Gropper's ruling released Wednesday says the court in Henry's wrongful conviction lawsuit found Crown prosecutors had "seriously infringed" on his right to a fair trial, demonstrating a "shocking disregard" for his Charter rights.

Gropper's ruling says evidence that wasn't disclosed to Henry "would have likely resulted in his acquittal at his 1983 criminal trial and the avoidance of sentencing as a dangerous offender."

Some of that evidence "included the large volume of material statements made by the various complainants, including the five plaintiffs," according to the ruling.

Gropper, however, found Henry liable in the civil lawsuit, saying in her ruling, "It is more likely than not that he was their attacker and performed the sexual assaults … on a balance of probabilities." 

Civil cases and criminal cases have "different standards of proof," the ruling says, and acquittals in crimes that weren't proven beyond a reasonable doubt do not prevent alleged victims from filing lawsuits.

"An acquittal is not a bar to a civil suit," the ruling says. "This action for damages addresses Mr. Henry's liability for the assaults on the plaintiffs, assessed on the civil standard of proof: whether, on a balance of probabilities, the plaintiffs have proved that he was the person who raped each of them." 

The women had argued that Henry's sentence was "cut short" and that the $8 million won in his lawsuit was "wrongfully gained," but the judge disagreed. 

"He should not have been convicted and should not have spent any time in jail," Gropper ruled. "He was entitled to the damages that he received."

Gropper's ruling says each of the women were "proud of their independence," living alone in their suites, and "their hopes and dreams were shattered when a stranger entered their apartments in the middle of the night."

In her decision, Gropper also says she doesn't disagree with the findings of the court that acquitted Henry in 2010 and didn't find "them to be in error." 

"Although I have found Mr. Henry to be liable for his sexual assaults of the plaintiffs, he was acquitted of the criminal charges after he served 27 years in federal custody," the ruling says. "He has not gone unpunished."