A Saskatoon court has agreed to let a man change his plea to not guilty and stand trial after he had previously pleaded guilty to a dozen counts of sexual assault.
Cecil Wolfe, who says he is a traditional healer, had originally pleaded guilty to a dozen counts of sexual assault involving women in Saskatoon, Muskeg Lake Cree Nation and Loon Lake.
Wolfe signaled last January that he wanted to change his plea and argue his innocence. A Saskatoon court has now reviewed that request and on Tuesday agreed to let him change the plea and argue his innocence. He will next be in court on Sept. 25.
In the earlier proceedings, Wolfe had signed a statement of facts saying he would often ask the women to visit while wearing a skirt, then ask them to remove their underwear before he began touching them inappropriately. Wolfe claimed what he was doing was not sexual and that he was removing “bad medicine.”
The assaults are alleged to have taken place between 2013 and 2021. The Saskatoon police sex crimes unit first charged him in September 2021.
The statement of facts, to which his defence counsel and the Crown prosecutors agreed, stated women sometimes didn’t question Wolfe, who is Indigenous, because he is an elder and because they believed he was a healer.
According to Saskatoon court, expunging a guilty plea relies on the applicant successfully arguing they were not properly informed, pleaded under duress, or did not fully appreciate the consequences of their actions.
Wolfe mainly speaks Cree and in a previous court hearing, the judge decided Wolfe may not have understood what he was agreeing to in the statement of facts.
Translators were brought to court moving forward to ensure Wolfe’s understanding.
Before changing his plea, a joint submission from the prosecution and the defence suggested a nine-and-half-year sentence.
— with files from Global News’ Easton Hamm and Nathaniel Dove