Former West Vancouver high school counsellor Joseph Scott William McLeod will be registered as a sex offender for 20 years.
In a decision given Thursday afternoon in North Vancouver Provincial Court, Judge Lyndsay Smith ruled that being included on the registry would not impact McLeod's life disproportionately to his crimes.
In December, Smith sentenced McLeod to a year in jail followed by two years’ probation for possessing child pornography, materials the judge characterized as being “horrific.”
But as of October 2023, there is no longer mandatory registration on the Sex Offender Registry for people in Canada convicted of sexual offences, and therefore that process involves separate legal arguments.
Before handing down her decision, Smith explained that the registration would occur unless the offender establishes that it wouldn’t help police prevent or investigate crimes of a sexual nature, or that the registration’s impact on the offender’s privacy or liberty is grossly disproportionate to the public interest – of preventing sex crimes in particular.
Contrary to the Crown arguing that neither condition was met, and seeking registration for 20 years, McLeod argued that he met both conditions and should not be registered as a sex offender.
Smith said that psychological assessments of McLeod determined his risk to re-offend as low and that he has strong support from family members and his partner. But the judge also stressed the severity of the materials he possessed, and that he was part of the community that leads to the exploitation and harm of child victims.
The judge also mentioned “the level of sophistication and efforts at avoiding discovery” undertaken by McLeod.
“I’m not satisfied that Mr. McLeod established that there would be no connection between making the order and the purpose of helping [the] police service help prevent or investigate crimes of a sexual nature by requiring a registration of information related to sex offenders,” Smith said.
“Having regard to his lack of stability – and by this I mean the recent move to Ontario, loss of career and connections in both B.C. and Ontario – his movements and locations are unpredictable and the circumstances that satisfy the reporting requirements have a heightened practical value here,” she said.
When he was arrested in January 2021, McLeod was suspended from his job as a Grade 8 counsellor at West Vancouver Secondary. Previously, McLeod had taught at McMath Secondary in Richmond.
