Lewisporte woman scared and angry after assault charge dismissed

A Lewisporte woman says she is angry at the provincial court system and scared for her safety after the man accused of assaulting her had his charges dropped.

Charmaine Collins was at Gander provincial court Friday for the trial of a man charged with assaulting her. But a communications mix-up left her waiting at the victim's services office while the accused's charges were being dropped.

"By the time I got into the courtroom on Friday, the judge had dismissed it all," Collins told CBC's Central Morning Show.

The trial was scheduled for 10 a.m. Collins arrived an hour early to meet with the Crown attorney, as requested by victim's services.

She waited at the victim's services office, but by 9:30 the Crown hadn't shown up. An office employee texted the attorney, who still didn't arrive.

At seven minutes after 10, Collins said she heard her name being paged for the courtroom, but by the time she got there, it was too late.

Woman felt 'like dirt' after case dismissed

"We walked from the interview room to the courtroom, and by then it had been thrown out," she said.

Collins said she felt "like dirt" when she learned the case had been dismissed.

"The accused was walking out of the courtroom at the same time, and he just looked at me and grinned," she said.

Collins said she was told the judge threw the case out because the Crown prosecutor didn't think Collins was in the building.

The Crown attorney apologized to Collins, and the Department of Justice later issued a public apology for "a case being dismissed before being heard on its merits," and said that officials had spoken with Collins.

"We offer our sincere apologies for the mistakes that happened. We are presently reviewing the matter internally to determine exactly how this transpired and if necessary, will change our processes to prevent such an incident from happening in the future," the apology said.

Collins said she couldn't understand the decision, especially since the trial had been postponed from the day before because the accused wasn't able to make it that day.

Wants to prevent future mistakes

Collins said she came forward because she hopes to prevent what happened to her from happening to anyone else.

"But because the victim took two minutes to walk to a courtroom, it got thrown out."

She's also applied for a protection order against the accused.

"I had no interaction with him before the incident, but I have three small children, and I live in Lewisporte, which is not a very big community, so now I'm fearful to go to the grocery store and that again," she said.

"I just hope that something happens where the Crown and the court system have to do something better," she said.