Historic Nunavut sex case opens with tears, accusations

Johnny Meeko, 60, a retired Nunavut teacher facing sex charges, is seen here in a photo from 2012 as he entered the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit. (FILE PHOTO)

The trial of former Sanikiluaq teacher Johnny Meeko, who faces more than 30 charges, mostly related to historical sexual offences involving children and youth, got off to an emotional start at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit Aug. 17.

Even before Justice Neil Sharkey, who will preside over the two-week, judge-alone trial, opened court just after 10 a.m., Inuit in the courtroom gallery wept and consoled each other.

When Meeko, 60, entered the courtroom in a charcoal T-shirt tucked into navy blue sweat pants and black sneakers, he too shared embraces and tears with a number of men and women across the barrier that separates where he will sit for the duration of the trial from those attending court.

Meeko faces 32 charges, most of which are historic sexual offences alleged by eight female and one male complainant, all of whom attended Nuiyak Elementary School in Sanikiluaq between 1972 and 2007, when the offences are alleged to have occurred.

The RCMP arrested Meeko in August 2012 after opening an investigation the previous month into allegations of sexual misconduct with students.

Crown prosecutor Amy Porteous called the first of the nine witnesses to the stand Aug. 17.

“What was it like having [Meeko] in your class?” Porteous asked the witness, whose identity the court is protecting with a publication ban.

“It wasn’t nice because we quickly learned how to cover our chest areas because every time we went near him he’d grab our chest really hard,” the witness answered.

“When he grabbed our chest he used to say that ‘I’m just trying to help the chest grow bigger or faster.’”

This was a daily occurrence for a lot of female students, the witness said, as were “stupid” questions like “are you growing hair down there?” and “are you wet down there?”

The inappropriate grabbing and question-asking took place in school and in public places, such as in the local grocery store, the witness said.

“He always used a joking voice, like it was all funny to him, just a game,” she testified.

“When I was having a rough day, I felt worthless. That’s why he’s saying that to me, because I’m a bad person,” the witness recalled thinking.

And when she was older, visiting Meeko’s mother with her own mother, the witness said Meeko — who was living with his mother at the time — put his hand down her pants for about five seconds before she managed, by struggling, to remove it.

“I told him I was going to tell my mother and he said, ‘if you tell I’m going to do the same thing to her,’ so I didn’t tell [my mother] because I didn’t want the same thing happen to her.”

The witness said she and a number of fellow students told their principal about the harassment, but the principal didn’t do anything.

“I don’t know why he didn’t believe us,” she said. “Maybe at that time kids weren’t listened to at all. Even if we have something important to say, adults would brush it off.”

The witness testified that later, when she became an adult, the unwanted and sexually explicit remarks continued.

“He started talking about all the women and prostitutes he had sex with… he tried to make me want him by talking about all the women he had sex with.”

When police arrested Meeko, the witness said she was relieved.

“All of the other students who are in school now don’t have to go through what we did.”

Before the trial got underway, Sharkey changed Meeko’s bail conditions.

Meeko had been living with his daughter in Iqaluit for most of the time since being charged. While there, he was subject to certain conditions such as checking in with local RCMP twice a week.

For the duration of the trial, Sharkey said Meeko can only leave his new bachelor apartment to attend court and he must be escorted by his lawyer or someone his lawyer designates.

The trial is currently scheduled to run for two weeks.