Port Coquitlam mosque director Saadeldin Bahr was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail on Friday for a sexual assault he committed in 2013.
Known as Dr. Saad in the community, the 55-year-old will also have to register as a sex offender.
In giving his reasons for the sentence, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Robert Crawford said he had considered Bahr's work in the community and the fact the defence submitted the "largest book of supporting letters I have ever seen."
But he also noted that while Bahr was deemed a low to moderate risk to reoffend, he had not taken responsibility for his actions and had showed no willingness to seek rehabilitation treatment.
"He is satisfied with himself as he is," Crawford said.
The judge also brought up the struggles that the victim, known as Z in court filings, has endured since the assault occurred. Crawford told the court that she had lost her faith in her religion and feels guilt about what happened. She believes that had she been in a better state of mind, she may have done more to stop the assault from happening, he said, citing her victim impact statement.
The incident has harmed her relationships with her family and husband and has done significant damage to her mental health, Crawford added.
"How long and how bad the effects of that will be are yet to be calculated," he said.
Crown prosecutor James Powrie sought a sentence of five years while Bahr's lawyer, Richard Fowler, said a sentence of two to three years was more appropriate.
As part of his sentence, Bahr will have to provide a DNA sample to the court and he is prohibited from possessing firearms for up to 10 years.
Bahr was found guilty last June of sexual assault stemming from an incident that took place in 2013 at the Masjid Al-Hidayah and Islamic Cultural Centre in Port Coqutilam. He had been counseling the victim, who was married and suffering from depression, bipolar disorder and anxiety.
Following afternoon prayer, Bahr took the woman up to his storeroom on an upper floor of the mosque, where the initial assault took place. The court heard that Bahr told the victim that she "had a bad curse on you and we have to remove it."
He then brought her back downstairs to sit with her family, but told her to not to speak and to read passages from the Koran.
Video surveillance submitted at trial showed that Bahr returned 35 minutes later and took Z back upstairs, where the assault continued.
At trial, he suggested to the court that his semen found in the victim's vagina could have come from a toilet seat, where he had ejaculated earlier in the day. He also said that the victim's DNA, which was found on his boxer shorts, may have been the result of the woman putting her hands down his pants.
Bahr was born in Egypt, where he became a doctor. He has worked for the World Health Organization helping refugees in Pakistan and in the former Yugoslavia, before moving to Canada in 1995.
Upon arriving in Port Coquitlam, he worked as an orderly at Riverview Hospital before starting the mosque in the late 1990s. He is married and the father of five children.
