A former Penticton woman who alleges she was attacked by David Bobbitt said she was scared for her life.
The woman, whose name is protected under court order, said Bobbitt jumped on her and pinned her down using his body weight, before ripping off her clothes and forcing himself inside her.
“I was helpless to move,” she testified before the court on Wednesday via closed circuit television from a separate room in the Penticton courthouse.
The woman alleges the incident happened in 2007 in a trailer owned by Bobbitt on Yorkton Avenue. Bobbitt was never charged.
This would have been four years before before he attacked a then 22-year-old Penticton woman in the second-hand store he ran on Ellis Street. Bobbitt has plead guilty to those charges and is before the courts in a sentencing and dangerous offender hearing.
As a Crown witness, the testimony of the woman in the 2007 alleged attack is being heard by Justice Peter Rogers to show a pattern of behaviour.
The woman in the 2007 attack said Bobbitt covered her mouth to prevent her from screaming and strangled her while raping her for about 45 minutes.
“It was to the point I could not breathe, I could not breathe,” she said.
During the incident she alleges Bobbitt stopped about four times but did not get off of her and didn’t say much.
“He was saying ‘You want this. You deserve this,’” the woman testified. “At one point he took his hand off my mouth, I said, ‘David you are disgusting and get off of me, please get off of me,’” she alleged.
Bobbitt eventually did move away from her when her two dogs, that were also in the trailer, began whining. She said she begged Bobbitt to let her take them out. She said she watched closely as Bobbitt pulled his pants back on and grabbed her clothes.
“I knew I had only an instant to get away from that man,” she said.
The woman said she grabbed her dogs by the leash and left the trailer, “speed walking” out of the campground towards Anthony’s Pub where she saw a neighbouring corner store open. She said Bobbitt followed her and by the time she reached the till in the store he was standing behind her so she mouthed to call 911 and then asked aloud to call a cab for her. As customers filtered into the store, she alleged Bobbitt went to the parking lot and she could hear him “ranting” that she better not call the police, that her dogs were going to get taken away and he would put her in a mental hospital. She said eventually Bobbitt ran away in the direction of his trailer.
The woman admitted she did not go to the RCMP right away and decided to spend the night at a friend’s house. She said she was scared, traumatized, didn’t know what to do with her dogs and thought it would be safer for her to stay there the night.
“I was basically in a full-fledged panic attack and I felt safe there,” she explained.
The following morning she caught a ride with her friend to Oliver where she attended the hospital with bruising around her neck, face and body. She also had scratches on her forehead. From there she was escorted by RCMP to the Penticton detachment, where they took pictures of her injuries, then to the Kelowna hospital.
The sentencing and dangerous offender hearing is scheduled to continue until July 8, with a continuation in September. The woman who was assaulted by Bobbitt in 2011 is expected to testify late next week. A third woman who is an alleged victim of Bobbitt’s is also expected to testify.
