Former Anglican priest Michael Hutt, 46, was sentenced in Sudbury to one year in jail and three years probation after he pleaded guilty to sexual exploitation in Sudbury, Ont., in January.
Mr. Justice John Poupore said that Mr. Hutt’s plea prevented the victim from having to testify at a trial and that Mr. Hutt had lost his standing in the community. He also said that the former priest’s actions were inexcusable, according to an account in The Sudbury Star.
Mr. Hutt apologized in court. “I freely give up my liberty. I thought in my weakness and frailty, I was in love. As for this, I will be eternally sorry,” he said, according to the Star.
Mr. Hutt was also ordered to perform 300 hours of community service, not to be alone with a female under 18 except for his own children, not to contact the victim or her family and to attend any counselling his probation officer requires.
Mr. Hutt was arrested in October, 2000, and charged with several sexual offences after a young woman told Ontario Provincial Police that she had had a relationship with him between the ages of 13 and 19, from 1994 to 2000.
The complainant, who cannot be named due to a publication ban, said the relationship became sexual after she turned 16, according to police.
Mr. Hutt was a priest on Manitoulin Island in the diocese of Algoma and married at the time of the offense. He has three children.
He resigned and relinquished the exercise of ministry while a priest in Parry Sound, Ont. in March, 2000.
