Brock Press

Issue date: 11/17/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Erika Hughes

On Nov. 9, 2009 a Niagara Falls man was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years for the murder of a sex worker on March 28, 2008.
The safety, rights and protection of sex workers in the Niagara Region has been a topic of much debate since a case where another women was murdered, and her killer was sentenced to one day in jail.
In the most recent case, Shaun Paul Christie pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the Superior Court of Justice in Welland. Originally charged with second-degree murder, Christie pleaded not guilty to that charge, in a trial by judge and jury.
The court heard the specifics of the day the crime took place, when Shari Bacon, 36, succumbed to injuries acquired when Christie, 24, struck her several times in the head with a martial arts weapon after they got into an argument over money in Christie's Stanley Ave. apartment in Niagara Falls last year.
The Crown read, from an agreed statement of facts, that Bacon was assaulted several times, accumulating injuries such as a broken nose, a puncture under the chin and damage to her left eye.
After the murder, Christie called his father, frantically insisting that he come over to his apartment. Christie claimed Bacon had come by his apartment as he was outside shoveling snow, and had agreed to consensual sex in his apartment.
He told his father that after sex, there had been an argument over money - which escalated into a fight during which, Christie admitted to his father, he had killed Bacon.
After wrapping the body and placing it in a secure empty apartment, Christie tried to clean up some of the scene, placing his bloody clothes in a bag and bringing them out to a garbage bin.
Christie's father then took his son to the Niagara Falls police station where Christie turned himself in and agreed to co-operate with police during their investigation of the case.
The previous case that raised awareness to the issue of the safety of sex workers in our community involved Wayne Ryczak, a 55-year-old construction worker who murdered Stephine Beck, 29, a sex worker.
The body of Beck was found in Vineland in the early morning of March 4, 2007. Ryczak was arrested the next day, claiming he acted in self-defense, that Beck attacked him first, and that Beck was not at his trailer to provide him with related sex worker services.
Like Christie, Ryczak pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder, but guilty to manslaughter in Superior Court in St. Catharines.
Judge Stephen Glithero, also the judge in Christie's case, sentenced Ryczak to one day in jail, in addition to the time he had already served since his arrest - served time the judge said was equivalent to 30 months.
In the case of Christie, Glithero admitted the victim received a number of blows and that Christie had "lost it".
The judge noted the maximum sentence for manslaughter as being life in prison, and that there is no minimum sentence.
In both cases, families wished for longer sentences, though Beck's mother was disgusted by the judge's decision.
In the latter case, although family still may not feel justice as being properly served, a different precedent has certainly been set - whether it is to be accepted by the community remains to be seen.

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