The owner of a property where a man allegedly confined and sexually assaulted women described him Friday as a man with two sides — one kind and polite, one sinister.
Meanwhile, an advocate says predators have been able to use the streets as “hunting grounds” because of a lack of accountability in the justice system and mistrust toward police from women who work in the sex trade.
Richard Robert Mantha, 59, is accused of confining, drugging and sexually assaulting three women in the Calgary area. Police allege Mantha approached women who were working in the sex trade, drugged them and took them to a rural property east of Calgary, where they were physically and sexually assaulted.
Mantha faces a total of 16 charges, including kidnapping, sexual assault, forcible confinement and assault with a weapon.
The crimes are alleged to have occurred between December 2021 and March 2023.
Police have not announced any further charges against Mantha but said they’re not ruling anything out and the investigation is ongoing.
Experts and advocates say the case highlights the vulnerability of women in the sex trade and raises questions about communication and co-ordination between police services, as Mantha was charged with two sex crimes about a year ago before Calgary police collaborated with the RCMP and laid a further 13 charges.
Court documents show Mantha was first charged with sexual assault and assault causing bodily harm in April 2022 by Strathmore RCMP. He failed to attend a court appearance on March 21 and a warrant was issued for his arrest.
At some point last month, Calgary police got involved and made a connection between the same individual and alleged crimes that were being committed against sex workers in the city.
Strathmore RCMP first received a report from an injured woman on April 22, 2022. On April 24, Mantha was arrested and released on an undertaking to appear in court on May 17, said Cpl. Gina Slaney with Alberta RCMP.
Between that date and January 2023, the case was adjourned seven times due to issues with lawyers, she added. Mantha also had court dates in January and February, where the case was also adjourned.
On April 6, 2023, Calgary police descended on a rural property on Vale View Road east of Calgary, where they arrested 59-year-old Mantha, and spent nearly a week searching, including with forensic trucks and cadaver dogs.
A property owner who said Mantha was renting a storage shed on their property said the raid came as a complete surprise.
“I think we’re still in shock to be honest with you … We didn’t know anything,” said Muriel Lock, who lives there with her husband Paul.
According to Lock, Mantha did odd jobs and worked in construction and vehicle repairs. He seemed to have two different sides to him, she said.
“To me he was kind, polite, respectful. To other men, I would say he was antagonizing, looking for a fight,” Lock said.
She said Mantha was not supposed to be living on the property, but only renting a shed for storage. When they confronted him about it, she said he approached her husband in a way that intimidated them.
She said she and her husband noticed Mantha had both male and female visitors and would frequently come and go with his truck in the middle of the night. He often made a lot of noise, she added, and described him as a “hoarder”.
At some point, she said Mantha visited his mother in Quebec, but she was unsure how long he’d been living in Alberta.
Lock said she’s disappointed with how the case has been handled — she said RCMP first showed up to her property about a year ago and handcuffed Mantha, but she doesn’t believe he was taken into custody.
She said Mantha told her the police visit was about a dispute he was having with one of his customers.
She said she and her husband were “left in the dark” at that time and continue to be.
“We were not allowed to know what it was about. I strongly feel something maybe should have been done and this could have been avoided,” Lock said.
“The cops are not saying anything to us,” she added.
Lock said Friday she had just returned from court to seek a restraining order against Mantha.
The arrest and charges did not come as a shock to Jacquie Meyer, founder and director of Her Victory, an organization that helps women who want to exit the sex trade or who have been forced into sex trafficking.
“I’ve been talking about this for a year and a half with (police) about missing women and what’s been going on as far as on the stroll, about women getting kidnapped,” Meyer said, referring to what is known as the “Prostitution stroll” in Forest Lawn, the neighbourhood where police allege Mantha stalked his victims.
Meyer said several of the alleged victims are being supported by her organization.
“They’re shaken up, they’re rattled and they have a fear of being out here … if this man gets out on bail, there’s a fear for them, being in this community,” she said.
She said she works with Calgary police closely and while they are supportive and have increased their presence in the area, the problem is accountability for the offenders.
“That perpetrator’s out 48 hours later, in the same hunting grounds, outside on our blocks. So it’s frustrating for police, they’re doing their job, but the culpability, that’s been very frustrating,” Meyer said.
She said she believes the three women who police have identified are not the only victims.
“Whether they come forward, I can’t answer that, that will be up to them. But there’s more,” Meyer said.
She added that many women working in the sex trade are hesitant to report to police which can lead to offences staying in the shadows.
“The girls rarely, rarely report,” Meyer said. “There’s ones that definitely don’t want to go to police for fear of their safety of reporting … some of them have their own criminal issues to deal with.”
Doug King, a professor of Justice Studies at Mount Royal University, said the allegations and subsequent arrest raise a number of questions.
“My mind eventually went right to the Pickton situation, because one of the problems there was the lack of interagency communication,” between Vancouver police and Surrey RCMP, King said, referring to Robert Pickton, the notorious serial killer who confessed to killing nearly 50 women and burying them in and around his pig farm.
“The police have to answer the question about interagency communication,” King added. “When did they have a sense of who this individual might be and were they in communication with one another back and forth? I think it’s a good question to ask, but I don’t think we should assume that the collaboration didn’t happen.”
Calgary Police did not respond to a request for comment for further details on how they identified Mantha as a suspect in additional offences.
Kim Arial, a lawyer who spoke in court on behalf of Mantha, told the Star she was unable to provide comment. On Friday, Arial told the court she was having trouble communicating with Mantha about the bail hearing and her retainer and asked for the matter to be adjourned to Tuesday.
Court records show Mantha has previously faced charges for uttering a threat, possession of stolen property and missing court appearances numerous times.
Mantha’s next court appearance is on Tuesday.
With files from Alex Boyd
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