Man sentenced to 5.5 years in prison for sexual assault with weapon in Charlottetown in 2022

A man who argued during his trial that he could not have sexually assaulted a Charlottetown woman because he was part of a gang that respected women has been sentenced to five and a half years in prison.

Harley David Coleman, 31, had a long criminal record and was wearing an electronic monitoring bracelet at the time of the attack on August 29, 2022.

Prince Edward Island Chief Judge Tracey Clements sentenced him in Charlottetown on Tuesday after he was previously found guilty of sexual assault with a weapon and violating a release order.

He will also be placed on the national sex offender registry for 20 years, must provide a DNA sample and will be banned from possessing firearms for the rest of his life.

Coleman had only been out of prison for 34 days after already serving a previous sentence. He was then accused of sexually assaulting the woman in her home after threatening her with two knives and a taser. A publication ban prevents the release of any details that could identify the victim.

Court documents show that he told her not to resist because he was in prison in Manitoba for first-degree murder, but that was not the case.

Previous attacks on women

Coleman has already been convicted twice in Prince Edward Island of assaulting women, one of which involved a weapon.

He had pleaded not guilty and stated that he and the woman had consensual sex.

Electronic surveillance recordings showed Coleman's path through Charlottetown over several hours on the night of Aug. 28, 2022, including a stop at the emergency shelter complex on Park Street. (Tony Davis/CBC)

He argued that he could not have sexually harassed her because he belonged to a gang whose code prohibited violence against women.

Coleman qualified his statement by saying that he would not “harm a woman who has self-respect.” He added that he knew that the plaintiff “respects herself.”

The two had attended school together on Prince Edward Island for years before they met by chance in Charlottetown on the evening of August 28, 2022.

Attorneys presented Coleman's electronic surveillance logs to the court to confirm that he had spent hours moving around the city that night, visiting, among other places, the woman's apartment, the emergency shelter on Park Street and the tent city near 350 Grafton Street.

Coleman was out of custody for just 34 days before he was charged with assault in August 2022. (Sally Pitt/CBC)

Childhood trauma and addiction disorders

After his conviction, Coleman's defense attorneys submitted a Gladue report – a document that details an Indigenous person's individual, family and community history for a judge to consider before sentencing.

Coleman is from the Berens River First Nation in Manitoba. His Gladue report says he was subjected to violence at home before being sent to Prince Edward Island to live with relatives. According to the report, his mother was convicted of murdering her nine-month-old foster daughter and he developed addictions at a young age.

The report said he never received help for the trauma he experienced.

The defense had demanded a four-year prison sentence for the charge of sexual abuse with a weapon, while the prosecution had demanded a seven-year prison sentence.

“Rehabilitation is only a faint hope at this point,” the prosecution stated in its motion for judgment. “He is a person who commits crimes indiscriminately and has a deeply rooted pro-criminal lifestyle.”