Sobhi Akra

By: Joel Goldenberg
The Suburban

St. Laurent resident Sobhi Akra, 41, recently lost an appeal of a 16-month sentence he received in Quebec Court for five counts of sexual assault and three counts of attempted sexual assault — one of the bases for his appeal was that Akra — being only a permanent resident and not a citizen for two years — could face a deportation hearing because his sentence is longer than six months.

Akra, a father of four, had already served four months, and had 12 months remaining in his sentence. He had been living in Canada for two years at the time of the incidents.

Akra pled guilty to sexually assaulting six women and two minors between October 2017 and November 2018, admitting to randomly approaching his victims from behind, grabbing them and running his hands over their bodies. The charges for some of the crimes had been reduced from sexual assault to attempted sexual assault “as the victims managed to escape Akra’s advances.”

According to the Aug. 14 Superior Court judgment, “the offences all involve touching the buttocks, thighs, hips, crotch, vulva or breasts. The appellant’s modus operandi consisted of sneaking up on the victims to touch them before running away. It was only after he had an eighth victim that the appellant was finally identified and arrested.”

Akra’s lawyer argued that “the sentences imposed on the counts of sexual assault and attempted sexual assault are clearly unfit and do not respect the principle of proportionality, and the judge made errors of principle that had an impact on the sentencing.”

But Superior Court judge Yvan Poulin ruled that “a reading of the judgment as a whole allows one to understand the reasoning underlying [the original judge’s] overall decision and to conclude that the sentences imposed on all the counts were fair and appropriate.

“It is clear from the judgment that the judge correctly took into account the particular circumstances of each of the crimes while keeping in mind that they were committed in the context of a series of crimes with many similarities. Although the judge did not go back over the specific circumstances of each of the offences when distributing the sentences, such an exercise was not necessary.” n