A Wallaceburg sex worker who killed a client in 2018, a rare reversal of the violence often found in that industry, will serve another 990 days in jail.
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Kourtny Audette, who turned 29 on Thursday, pleaded guilty Aug. 6, 2021, to manslaughter in the April 18, 2018, death of Nick Laprise after initially facing a charge of first-degree murder.
Superior Court Justice Paul Kowalyshyn handed down a sentence of eight-and-a-half years, along with a lifetime weapons ban, on Thursday in a Chatham courtroom.
The judge gave Audette 2,112 days of credit for the three years, 10 months and six days she spent in pre-sentence custody since being arrested on April 18, 2018.
Chatham-Kent Crown attorney Rob MacDonald had asked for a 10-year penitentiary term while Audette’s lawyer, Laura Joy, had sought a conditional sentence.
Melissa Lukings, a board member of London-based SafeSpace, as well as a media and communications person with the Canadian Alliance for Sex Work Reform, acknowledged this was an unusual case, saying sex workers are much likelier to be harmed and often remain quiet about the violence they suffer.
If someone in the sex industry is charged with a crime, they are publicly outed as a sex worker, which still carries a heavy social stigma, Lukings noted.
“There’s an underlying need for confidentiality and discretion,” she said.
Since sex workers are more exposed to risk, advocates within the industry have been calling for changes to the laws pertaining to sex work, Lukings said.
“They would be much less at risk if people were allowed to work together or hire security,” she said.
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If sex workers could operate together in one location, rather than alone, clients would more likely conform to the boundaries set by the workers and would be less likely to push those boundaries with other people nearby.
Kelly Tallon Franklin, a human-trafficking survivor who founded a not-for-profit, Courage for Freedom, to help victims, also said the laws need to change to provide more supports for sex workers.
“We do support, regardless of their circumstances, that every woman has the right to say no to the commodification of her body, whether it’s with an intimate partner or anyone else,” she said.
An understanding of how “historical patriarchy, misogyny and colonized practices have affected how we care for young women and girls, and what’s lacking” is central to changing society’s views, Tallon Franklin added.
According to a previously agreed statement of facts read into court on Aug. 6, 2021, Audette worked as an escort and Laprise had been one of her clients.
After arranging to visit Audette, Laprise arrived at her Wallaceburg home on April 18, 2018, MacDonald said. An hour later, police received a 911 call about a stabbing at the home.
Before that 911 call, Audette phoned her father and stepmother, who then came to her home. The stepmother said Audette told her she declined to have sex with Laprise and then stabbed him when he wouldn’t stop, the Crown said.
Kowalyshyn said he recognized Audette had no prior criminal record and suffered from underlying mental-health conditions.
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“But this was a violent offense,” the judge said. “Ms. Audette used a large hunting-style knife to inflict the fatal wound.”
Kowalyshyn said Audette stabbed a “defenceless and extremely vulnerable individual, and without any warning.”
He said the situation was, at its core, a business transaction entered into by two consenting adults for “sex for hire.” One party, however, eventually decided they did not want to proceed with that transaction, the judge added.
“That decision did not warrant the taking of a life,” Kowalyshyn said. “It is important that a message be sent to those who choose to arm themselves with a dangerous weapon, whether intended for protection or otherwise, and then proceed to use that weapon in a manner that results in the loss of life of another.”
During the trial, the court heard an emotional witness statement from the victim’s mother, Natalie Laprise, read by MacDonald.
“I’m having a hard time to find the words to tell you how Nicholas’s murder has impacted my life because there are no such words to describe the pain, anger and despair that I felt from his murder,” Natalie Laprise said.
She said her son’s murder took everything from her, including his laughter, his face, his caring hugs, his helpfulness and his thoughtfulness.
Audette also made an emotional apology during the trial that included offering her deepest sympathies to the Laprise family.
“I regret this every day of my existence. I regret what has happened. I understand the severity of my actions. They haunt me day and night,” she said. “I take full responsibility for everything that has happened, and I am truly and deeply sorry.”