Fort Erie man gets eight years for repeated abuse of stepdaughter

A Fort Erie man received an eight-year penitentiary sentence Wednesday after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting his stepdaughter almost daily for six years and threatening to kill her siblings if she disclosed the abuse.

The 40-year-old man, who cannot be named to protect the victim’s identity, was convicted on five charges including sexual interference, uttering threats and weapons-related offences in Ontario Court of Justice in St. Catharines.

Details of the ruling and trial were first reported by the Niagara Falls Review.

The abuse began when the victim was 13 years old and ended shortly before she turned 19. She spent several months in a women’s shelter before filing a report with Niagara Regional Police last summer.

The man was arrested in 2025 following an investigation by the Niagara Regional Police sexual assault unit. With credit for roughly 17 months of pretrial custody, he has 6.5 years remaining to serve. His name will appear on the national sex offender registry for 20 years.

Assistant Crown attorney Abby Woolf told the court the offender warned the victim that if she told anyone, he would stab her entire family and put them in body bags. He also told her she was worthless and deserved the abuse.

The teenager complied to protect her siblings. She knew her stepfather kept a knife collection and a rifle in the home, and both were seized when he was arrested.

Judge David Thomas said the weapons gave the threats a “sinister cast” and made the danger very real to the girl.

Thomas said the abuse stripped the victim of her childhood and left her with nothing to anticipate but daily sexual violence from her stepfather.

Woolf called the offence an egregious breach of trust and described the sexual violence as among the most grievous violations of a person’s bodily integrity.

Defence counsel Jeffrey Root said his client accepts responsibility. The guilty pleas spared the victim from having to testify in court.

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