SASKATOON, Sask. — In Bangladesh, she had a master’s degree, a respected job, and 18 years of honourable service. She earned good money and never had to ask anyone for anything, court heard.
She was, by her own description in her victim impact statement, independent. That independence changed to fear and dependence after she came to Canada where two men exploited her trust and her hopes of building a new life.
On Oct. 22, in Saskatoon Provincial Court, Judge Miguel Martinez sentenced Mohammed Masum to a global sentence of 14 years for one count of human trafficking and three counts of sexual assault. Sohel Haider received the mandatory minimum four-year sentence for human trafficking. The judge found them both guilty in August.
“I think, why did I come to Canada?” she said in her victim impact statement that was read to the court. “Why did I try to stay in Canada to do this job when I had everything I wanted back home? This must have been a bad or wrong decision, which is why all these bad things happened to me.”
During a seven-week trial, court heard that the Bangladesh woman was brought to Saskatchewan, isolated and exploited for cheap labour.
Haider and Masum were charged in June 2023 by Swift Current RCMP. The offences occurred between Aug. 1, 2022, and March 31, 2023.
The woman's identity is protected by a publication ban.
Trust placed in fellow Muslims, and betrayed
Court heard she placed her trust in the men as fellow Muslims and Bangladeshis. Haider, she said, manipulated her emotionally, convincing her it was acceptable to come to Canada and work for him.
“I trusted them as a Muslim, as a country person, but they broke my trust,” she said. “I couldn’t trust anybody as easily anymore because of them. I don’t know if I can ever return to how I used to be.”
She described Haider as more at fault in her eyes than Masum, because he was the one who brought her here.
“How could he do something like this to his Bangladeshi sister just for some money? How could he do this to a Muslim girl just for his personal gain?”
Shame, gossip, and a family’s honour
The loss extended beyond her own life, court heard. Bangladesh, she said, is a society where gossip is a pervasive social reality. When word of what happened reached her community, her family faced the kind of talk that blames a woman, not the men who harmed her.
“I couldn’t go back to my country,” she said. “I couldn’t explain to my office that I didn’t do anything wrong.
“As a result, even after 18 years of honourable service, I will not get my financial benefit from the office. My office also took away the apartment that was given to me by the government. People in society now talk bad about my family, which is ruining the future of my siblings. They destroyed me mentally, economically, socially.”
Her family initially tried to support her, she said, but gossip in the community sometimes led to frustration, misunderstandings and breakdowns in communication.
Her mother, she said, “comes at me angrily and asks, ‘why did you have to go to Canada? Why did you need to leave? Things were good for you here.’”
Her mother often apologized the next day, but the words still hurt, she said.
The sentences
Crown prosecutor Leslie Dunning sought a sentence of five and a half years for Haider on the human trafficking charge, arguing that the woman’s vulnerability and Haider’s position of trust and authority were aggravating factors. The Crown had initially proposed 6.5 years before reducing its position to 5.5 years after taking totality and proportionality into consideration.
Defence lawyer Chris Gratton argued that the four-year minimum was appropriate, pointing to the absence of physical violence, threats, and sexual abuse in Haider’s offence.
Judge Martinez agreed that the minimum sentence was appropriate. He found that Haider planned and orchestrated the trafficking, controlling where the woman lived and worked and taking advantage of her dependence on him for her work permit, food and shelter.
But the judge concluded that the mandatory minimum already accounted for the abuse of trust and exploitation of a vulnerable victim. He found no additional aggravating factors warranting a sentence over four years.
For Masum, the Crown sought 15 years, describing the sexual and psychological abuse as deliberate, prolonged, and repeatedly inflicted, and arguing that the counts should be sentenced consecutively because they were separate acts committed in separate locations over different periods.
Defence lawyer Zachary Carter argued for a global sentence of seven to nine years, suggesting as an example a breakdown of four years for trafficking and four years globally for the three sexual assault counts.
The judge imposed a global sentence of 14 years. He found that the individual sentences, added together, would have totalled 21 and a half years. He calculated five and a half years for trafficking, five years for the Saskatoon-area assaults, eight years for the repeated assaults in Tisdale, and three years for the Regina assault.
Applying the principle of totality, he reduced the global sentence to 14 years, broken down as four years for trafficking, three years for the Saskatoon-area assaults, five years for the Tisdale assaults, and two years for the Regina assault. All four terms are consecutive.
Both men received 114 days of credit for 76 days spent in custody before sentencing.
Haider was ordered to pay $5,885 in restitution and Masum was ordered to pay $12,268 in unpaid wages. Both restitution orders are payable immediately through the provincial court so they can be registered as judgments.
Both must provide DNA samples, were given 10-year bans on possessing firearms and ammunition, and lifetime bans on possessing prohibited and restricted firearms and weapons.
They were also ordered not to have any direct or indirect contact with the woman while in custody, or for the rest of their lives.
Masum must register with the National Sex Offender Registry under the Sex Offender Information Registration Act (SOIRA) for 20 years. The SOIRA order applies to the three sexual assault convictions.
ljoy@sasktoday.ca
