Achi news desk-
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Leaving her elderly father on a basement floor for two days in dirty adult diapers won’t mean jail time for a Calgary woman.
Justice Indra Maharaj accepted a joint submission from the Crown and defense on Wednesday to order a conditional sentence of two years less a day for Tara Picard to be followed by 12 months’ probation.
Prosecutor Donna Spaner and defense counsel Shaun Leochko proposed a term in the community that will include eight months of 24-hour house arrest followed by a nightly curfew for the second eight months.
Maharaj also agreed with lawyers to order Picard to perform 300 hours of community service over the course of the three-year sentence.
The Calgary Court of Justice noted that the number of community service hours was “a lot” to commit to.
But Maharaj said it showed Picard, 52, was truly remorseful for her behavior towards her father, who Postmedia is not identifying because of the embarrassing nature of the facts of the case.
“What that shows to me is that Ms. Picard sincerely acknowledges what has happened here,” the judge said of her willingness to complete community service.
“What I interpret from that is Ms. Picard’s willingness to give back to the community.”
Picard pleaded guilty in January to charges of assault and failure to provide the necessities of life for her 77-year-old father.
Court heard caregivers found an elderly Calgary man on the basement floor of his daughter’s southeast home wearing dirty adult diapers.
At the time, Picard was responsible for her father’s day-to-day care after he was moved into her home, Spaner, reading from an agreed statement of facts, told the court at the time.
“He had a number of medical conditions, including non-insulin-dependent diabetes, coronary artery disease, some early dementia-like symptoms and chronic alcoholism,” Spaner said.
“(He) had been living independently in an apartment building in Calgary. Family members became concerned that he was not taking care of himself safely.”
With the help of Alberta Health Services he was moved to a home where Picard lived.
A registered nurse assigned to his home care attended 38 Street SE on November 15, 2021, to drop off food bank supplies and was told he was sleeping downstairs.
When the nurse called about an hour and a half later and spoke to the man on the phone she said he was lying on the floor, collapsed and unable to get up.
When he returned to the home with a colleague he found the victim lying on his back on the floor.
“(He) said he had been lying on the floor for two days,” Spaner said.
Leochko said that Picard was overwhelmed by the situation she had been thrust into.
“It was more than she could really handle,” she said.
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