Desi man in Canada now faces jail time, deportation.
By Deepak Chitnis
WASHINGTON, DC: An Indian permanent resident in Canada has been sentenced to nine months in prison, three years on probation, 20 years in a federal sex offender database, and now faces deportation back to his home country.
Yashandeep Dhillon, 32, was tried and convicted last October for attempting to solicit sex from a youth under the age of 16. Over the course of September through December of 2010, Dhillon engaged in online conversations with someone who he believed to be a 13 year-old girl. Over the course of their “friendship,” the conversations became increasingly graphic, with Dhillon moving into more sexually explicit territory as the weeks went by.
In total, there were 10 exchanges made between Dhillon and the girl during their courtship. Transcripts revealed during the court case show that Dhillon made statements about wanting to have sex with the girl “all night long,” talking about engaging in oral sex with the girl, and arranging a meeting at a bus stop in Regina, Saskatchewan on December 17.
When Dhillon arrived at the bus stop, however, he was greeted by police, who had set up the fake identity of a 13 year-old girl in order to lure child predators into the open. The officers were part of a task force entitled the Internet Child Exploitation Unit. Dhillon was arrested and tried, and finally sentenced on Monday in Court of Queen’s Bench.
“I am sincerely sorry for you. I am sorry for your family,” Justice Richard Elson said in handing down the verdict. “But the circumstances of this case, the elements of sentencing which are stipulated in the Criminal Code have left me no choice but to impose the kind of sentence I have decreed in this matter.”
The Canadian judicial system says that any incarceration of six months or more automatically means that the subject in question is eligible for deportation back to their home country. Although Dhillon’s lawyers tried to get his jail time reduced to just three months, thereby allowing him to avoid the risk of deportation, but the prosecution lobbied for at least a year behind bars. Such deportation, reserved for “serious criminality,” can be invoked without appeal.
The only thing that could save Dhillon is that, at the time of his crimes, the bar for deportation was a two-year jail term. Justice Elson said that the matter now belongs with immigration authorities, and they will have to decide if Dhillon should be deported or allowed to stay in Canada, where he has been living since the summer of 2010.
To contact the author, email to deepakchitnis@americanbazaaronline.com