A former Sechelt RCMP officer is on trial for charges of sexually assaulting a young male teenager. Gary Rudy Groenke, 48, was in Supreme Court in Port Alberni last week answering to charges of sexual assault, sexual assault of a minor and invitation to sexual touching.
His alleged victim told the court that when he was about 10 years old and residing in Sechelt in the late '80s, Groenke was his football coach.
"He had a good rapport with the youth of the town," said the man, now 30 years old. The court heard that the boy visited his former coach in Port Alberni in the early '90s and that Groenke allegedly assaulted him during that three-day visit.
The trial is to continue in Victoria beginning Tuesday, Feb. 5.
Last week both the alleged victim and the accused testified. Groenke has denied all allegations and provided receipts, kept all these years, suggesting that the teen was 14 years old when the visit took place. The legal age of consent is 14.
If the court agrees that he was 14 and not 12 or 13, the sexual assault of a minor charge will be invalid. In that case, the Crown will still have to prove that a sexual incident took place and that the victim didn't agree to it.
Groenke was a member of the RCMP in Sechelt until 1989 when he transferred briefly to Langley. He retired a couple of weeks later and relocated to Vancouver Island. He bought an old waterfront hotel and purchased farmland and a house on the outskirts of Port Alberni.
The alleged victim testified that Groenke invited him for a visit and then flew him from Sechelt to Nanaimo. From there they rode in Groenke's Porsche to the mid-island community.
He told the court that late in the evenings of his visit, Groenke allowed him into the hotel's pub and gave him alcoholic beverages. On the first night when he went up to his room, "I was definitely not sober," said the man.
He told the court that Groenke came into his room during the night and molested him.
Groenke produced Tyee Air receipts showing that the visit took place in 1992. He said he did not give the teen any alcohol and did not have any sexual contact with him.
Groenke also testified that the youth attended a B.C. Lions football game with him three or four weeks after the visit in his hotel and that he came back again to spend a night with him and his family five months later.
In 2005 the alleged victim travelled back to his childhood home of Sechelt and told police his story. In an effort to make the case against Groenke stronger, RCMP arranged to tape record phone conversations between the complainant and the accused.In those taped conversations Groenke apologized to the man, believing that he'd withdraw his complaint. The complainant spoke about Groenke having "fondled" and "molested" him when he was a child and Groenke told him on tape that he was sorry.
"I'm sorry that this happened to a nice human being like yourself," Groenke told the man in a phone conversation recorded by police in March, 2006.
Groenke attempted to show his gratitude after he believed the complaint was withdrawn, by buying the man a pair of Calgary Flames hockey tickets.
The trial ran out of time last Friday with Groenke still testifying in his own defence. He has yet to be cross examined by the Crown.
