VANCOUVER — A special prosecutor is urging British Columbia's Court of Appeal to overturn the acquittal of a polygamous leader who was accused of taking a 15-year-old girl across the border for a sexual purpose.
In February 2017, a B.C. Supreme Court judge concluded the Crown failed to prove James Oler arranged to transfer the girl from Canada to the United States to marry another member of his fundamentalist sect.
A prosecutor has told an appeal hearing that Warren Jeffs, president of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the U.S., called Oler in June 2004 when he was the presiding elder and bishop of the community in Bountiful, B.C.
Peter Wilson argues that Jeffs told Oler to bring the girl to the U.S. to be married and, because followers believe Jeffs has a "direct connection to God," Oler swiftly complied and received a wife in return.
Wilson says the trial judge acquitted Oler because he was not convinced Oler did anything within Canada's borders to arrange the girl's transfer.
But Wilson says proof of any wrongdoing inside Canada is not necessary to convict Oler.
Oler is to be sentenced next week in a separate case in which he was found guilty of polygamy for marrying five women.
