Ben Levin
The sentencing hearing for Benjamin Levin, a former top bureaucrat in Ontario’s Ministry of Education, took place from April 13 to 15. In March, Levin pled guilty in court to three out of seven charges: creating written child pornography, encouraging a person to commit sexual assault, and possessing child pornography.
Critics of Ontario’s new sex ed curriculum note Levin was deputy minister of education while Kathleen Wynne was the head of the ministry and the province’s controversial sex education program was being developed in 2010.
Levin was arrested in July 2013 after an online investigation where police posed as parents interested in committing sexual assault on their children. Levin advised parents on how to sexually abuse their children in incest chat rooms. Toronto Police Det.-Const. Janelle Blackadar posed as a single mom wanting to molest her children. Levin urged her to abuse her daughter and claimed he had molested his own daughters when they were 12. Det.-Const. Paul Robb, the police officer heading the investigation, told Justice Heather McArthur that images of young girls having sex with each other and with adults were found on Levin’s laptop, as well as scenes of bondage.
Levin is asking for two years in a federal penitentiary as opposed to the 3.5 years requested by the Crown. “All of this is a source of lasting shame to me and that pain and remorse will remain with me for life, whatever sentence I receive,” said Levin. He claimed he is getting professional assistance since his arrest in July 2013. Lawyer Clayton Ruby asked the judge to consider the damage to Levin’s public reputation in sentencing. He also argued that Levin had no intention to harm children. Letters from Levin’s wife and daughters indicated that they had never been abused.
Levin’s psychiatrist, Dr. Julian Gojer, told the court that he was engaging in “fantasies” to help him deal with a stressful moment in his life. Gojer, however, was aware that in one instance, Levin had actually met a British dad from his chatroom while on a trip to Amsterdam, who had sent him pictures of his daughters. Levin admitted to an undercover agent during an online chat that he found one of the daughters “very arousing” and could talk to her dad about “f–-ing her.”
Crown attorney Patricia Garcia argued that Levin was moving beyond fantasy, as he used his own name, described himself as a Toronto university professor, and made a spreadsheet of the 1,750 people he met in the chatrooms, writing which online profiles he thought were “fake.” The spreadsheet also included the names and ages of the children, as well as the sexual preferences of the adults interested in molesting them. The judge will announce Levin’s sentence on May 29.
