A West Kelowna man found guilty last year of a violent 2016 rape was sentenced to five years in prison, less one day for time served.
Jeremy Czechowski was led away from the courtroom by sherriffs Friday, while his friends and family wished him well from the gallery. He flashed a peace sign before he was taken into custody.
READ MORE: VICTIM TESTIFIES
Czechowski, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Ball said, held down and choked a woman whose name is protected under a publication ban as he violently sexually assaulted her at least three times over the course of two hours. At one point, Ball said, the woman lost consciousness.
The injuries she sustained during the assault were consistent with self defense and violent sexual assault, according to testimony from the doctor who treated her.
The woman’s acrylic nails had ripped off half way up the nail bed, there was evidence of bruising on her neck and head, she suffered pain in her genetalia and had deep purple bruises on the inside of her upper arms, as well as other injuries.
These injuries were at odds with Czechowski’s account of the night.
READ MORE: CZECHOWSKI TESTIFIES
“She jumped in my lap within a moment of being (at my house),” Czechowski told the court during the trial, in February, later noting that the two had consensual sex.
That was a claim that the woman vehemently denied when she testified.
“I suggest you and Czechowski were kissing in the bedroom and engaged in consensual sex,” said Czechowski’s lawyer, Cory Armour during cross examination.
“I did not give him consent to touch me,” she said, loudly and clearly.
Both the accused and the woman were under the influence of drugs and alcohol at the time the assaults occurred.
The woman suffers from severe PTSD and requires a perscription for Ativan due to anxiety and fear, resulting from the incident. She also had to move away from Kelowna because she no longer felt safe.
Czechowski is 36 years old, and has a Grade 11 education, according to his pre-sentence report. He was raised by an alchoholic who phyiscially disiplined him, though Czechowski claimed he wasn’t a victim of any abuse. He had negative peer relationships and spent some time in juvenile detention.
He refused to give the names of women he had long relationships with, so Ball said he couldn’t be sure how he behaved in those circumstances.
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