Ryan Mooney received a 12-month conditional sentence and three years probation this week after pleading guilty in B.C. Supreme Court to sexually assaulting a 15-year old girl during the production of a youth play between January and March 2006.
Mooney, creator and former director Broadway or Bust, a summer theatre camp, faced four counts of sexual exploitation based on allegations of sexual touching while he was acted as choreographer of a play unassociated with the camp.
A written judgement was not provided to the public, but the Province newspaper reported that Mooney pled guilty to allegations that he entered a dressing room while holding hands with the girl, locked the door and pushed her up against the wall. He put his hands on her upper chest and asked her to perform oral sex on him, but she refused. He undid his pants but when he loosened his grip on her momentarily, she was able to flee the premises.
The girl later complained to her mother and the matter was report to the RCMP.
Mooney is a graduate of Howe Sound Secondary School and is well known to the community for his involvement in numerous theatrical productions with school-aged children. Most recently, he headed the acting camp Broadway or Bust beginning in the summer of 2005. The camp resulted in a theatrical production that involved as much as 50 children aged 7 to 18.
Crown counsel Gail Barnes told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Arne Silverman during court proceedings that Mooney had befriended the girl. The pair exchanged email addresses with her during a certain amount of flirting going on prior to the offence.
A psychiatrist's report stated Mooney was a low risk to re-offend. Barnes pointed to the report and noted Mooney's lack of a prior criminal record in calling for a 15-month conditional sentence followed by three years probation.
The judge gave Mooney a 12-month conditional sentence and ordered that Mooney have no contact with the victim or her family and not be in the presence of children under the age of 18 unless accompanied of an approved adult.
The courts have put a ban on publication of any information that would identify the victim as well as a ban on the name of the school and school district. Charges against a second alleged victim were earlier stayed by the Crown.
