Woman who met Nygard at Quebec club is final complainant set to testify in sexual assault trial | CBC News

WARNING: This article contains descriptions of sexual abuse and vulgar language.

For two weeks, a Toronto courtroom has heard graphic and disturbing testimony from four women who all claim they were sexually assaulted by one-time Canadian fashion mogul Peter Nygard.

And with each complainant, Nygard’s defence lawyer, Brian Greenspan, has tried to whittle away at their stories, attempting to show contradictions with past statements the women gave to police and questioning elements of their testimony.

On Monday, the trial is expected to hear from the fifth and final complainant — a woman whom Nygard met at a club in Hull, Que. Her testimony will attempt to add to the narrative the Crown has been pushing forward — that Nygard established a similar pattern of sexual assault with each of the women.

Nygard, 82, has pleaded not guilty in Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice to five counts of sexual assault and one count of forcible confinement. Justice Robert Goldstein is presiding over the jury trial.

The Crown contends that in these five cases — which cover a period from the late 1980s to 2005, and involve women ranging in age from 16 to their late 20s — Nygard used his power and status to lure them to his downtown Toronto office building.

Once there, they would end up in this private bedroom suite, usually following a tour of his building. And it’s inside that suite, the Crown alleges — backed by each of the four women who has testified — that Nygard would attack and sexually assault them.

Some of the women also told the court that the mirrored door leading into his bedroom — which included a large bed, bathtub, kitchenette and televisions embedded in the wall — had no handle and that Nygard punched in a security code on a pad to unlock if from inside.

Court heard from 3 women last week

Jurors heard testimony from one complainant on the first week of the trial, and last week, they heard from three women — including one who was 16 when she said she met Nygard at his office building after being taken there by a much older man she had been seeing. When she arrived, they ended up in his bedroom, where she was held down by both men, she testified.

The woman said she was forced to perform oral sex on the man she had been seeing and that a woman who was present sucked on one of her nipples. Meanwhile, Nygard performed oral sex on her, before penetrating her vagina with his penis, she told the court.

The third complainant said she met Nygard on a flight from Turks and Caicos to the Bahamas and was asked to help host his parties. She hosted one at his Bahamas residence and then was asked to host a party at his Toronto headquarters.

But once inside his private bedroom, she told the trial, the guests started to undress, and she noticed there was pornography on two of the televisions in his bedroom.

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