A policeman who sought “sexual satisfaction” from victims he met on duty is awaiting sentencing

An Edmonton police officer has admitted using his position of power to prey on women he met while on duty for “his own sexual gratification.”

Edmonton Police Service St. Hunter Robinz pleaded guilty in King’s Bench on October 21 to one count of breach of trust. He is awaiting sentencing and will appear in court again on Friday.

Robinz admitted to numerous breaches of trust during on-duty contacts with eight women that occurred between March 2017 and June 2019.

The court heard he had a pattern of aggressive behavior – he repeatedly made inappropriate sexual advances to crime victims or complainants he met in his work.

An agreed statement of facts filed with the court details Robinz’s misconduct toward eight victims. Their names are protected by a publication ban.

The allegations were made by the Alberta Serious Incident Response Team, which launched an investigation in August 2019 into Robinz’s sexual assault allegations.

He was arrested in 2021 after a regulator’s investigation found evidence that he had committed repeated breaches of trust, including repeated searches of secure police databases for names and addresses unrelated to his duties as a police officer.

Three other charges against Robinz – sexual assault, unauthorized use of a computer database and a second charge of breach of trust – were stayed by the Crown.

An unwelcome encounter

The investigation began in August 2019 after Robinz encountered a 24-year-old woman who alleged she was attacked by Robinz after he entered her home uninvited while he was in uniform and on duty.

The unwanted sexual advances occurred on the night of June 29, 2019.

The woman was intoxicated and anxious after a night out at a bar when she called police from a public park.

Robinz and another officer responded to the call and drove her home, stopping along the way to collect the keys to the woman’s Edmonton apartment from her roommates, who had a shift at a McDonald’s restaurant.

Robinz returned to the woman’s home later that evening, using her roommate’s keys to enter the apartment. The woman remembers that she cried when Robinz put his hands around her waist and tried to kiss her.

He kissed her several times and she pushed him away and yelled at him. He finally let her go upstairs to use the restroom, and when she came out, he was already halfway up the stairs.

He tried to kiss her again and she asked if he needed a warrant to stay in her house. She told him “no” and, the court heard, had to push him away again. She begged him to leave, asking him to do so more than 20 times before he finally left.

“She stated that she was lucky she wasn’t ‘out of my mind’ drunk because she was able to say ‘no’, push him away and he eventually left,” the statement read.

The next morning, the woman received a series of sexually explicit text messages from Robinz on social media through his Ranger Sparrow Facebook account.

The following month, she reported the assault to ASIRT and the agency’s investigation into Robinz began. Robinz was transferred from patrol to administrative duties.

His work phone belonging to the police was confiscated. Investigators discovered a series of messages that showed that Robinz was soliciting sexual contact with multiple crime victims.

In March 2017, he sent suggestive text messages to the sister of a woman whom he had been called to help when she had suicidal thoughts.

In May 2018, he was called to assist a woman responding to a suspicious person in her yard. A few days later, she reported Robinz to EPS’s Public Standards Branch for sending her an unwanted and inappropriate text message.

The woman was concerned that Robinz had contacted her on the social media platform Snapchat in a way that suggested he had access to her personal information.

In October 2018, Robinz responded to a domestic violence call about a man who had violated court orders and contacted his ex-partner. Robinz soon began a relationship with the domestic violence victim.

The woman told investigators about her relationship with Robinz after her ex-partner again violated his court order and sexually assaulted him.

The EPS Professional Standards Branch investigated the relationship, but according to the statement of facts, Robinz lied that he had met the woman in his capacity as a police officer.

The other victims include a victim in an attempted burglary case and a domestic violence victim who was attacked at the Edmonton Inn. After she called the police and asked for help, Robinz became the lead investigator in her case.

All crimes occurred while Robinz was on active duty.

Robinz admitted that he used his public position for purposes other than the public good, mainly for his own sexual gratification.– Agreed statement of facts

“Robinz admitted that he used his position in public office for purposes other than the public good, primarily for his own sexual gratification,” the agreed statement of facts said.

During last week’s hearing, Sgt. staff. Harry Grewal, chief of the EPS sexual assault section, commented on the impact of Robinz’s misconduct.

Grewal described Robinz’s actions as egregious. He said the officer’s behavior had a profound impact on the victims and undermined public trust in the police.

Grewal wrote that Robinz became a victim of already defenseless people and undermined trust in law enforcement agencies.

“Every day our officers encounter people at the worst moments of their lives. Everyone is in a state of vulnerability, some to a significant degree,” Grewal wrote.

“The trust that the community places in us in these moments is significant and we must strive to respect it.”

Robinz remains a member of EPS, but has been suspended without pay since March 2021 after being charged by Parkland RCMP with assault and unsafe storage of a firearm during the alleged attack on his common-law wife.

He was convicted of carelessly using or storing a firearm for storing a rifle and two magazines of live ammunition in an open box in a wardrobe in his bedroom, but was acquitted of assault.

The maximum penalty for breach of trust is 14 years in prison. Sentencing deliberations are expected to continue on Friday.