MONTREAL - A well-known member of Montreal's Jewish community and a longtime academic dean at John Abbott College will be going to jail in December for possession of child pornography.
Bill Surkis is a former director of B'nai Brith, a Jewish human rights group, who reached a plea agreement with the prosecution to ask for the minimum 45-day jail sentence for the child pornography charge.
But the two sides do not agree on what should happen to Surkis after he is released.
Prosecutors are arguing for Surkis to be placed on the national sex offender registry, to provide a DNA sample, and that he be forbidden from using computers or going to public parks and other places children congregate.
Surkis's lawyer says jail along with community service will suffice.
Surkis took the stand at his sentencing hearing Thursday and expressed remorse for what he did.
"I'm devastated," he said. "I'm sorry…there are no words that can be spoken to describe what I did. It's very difficult to get undressed in public."
In May the 71-year-old pleaded guilty to one count of accessing child pornography, and another count of child pornography possession after police found nine hours of videos involving children between six and 14 years old performing sexual acts on his computer.
A charge of distributing child pornography was dropped.
Court-appointed experts say Surkis is neither a pedophile nor a dangerous sex offender, and that his arrest and public humiliation means he's unlikely to re-offend.
His lawyer, Stephen Slimovitch, asked that Surkis be spared the usual probation conditions, and he plans to ask that Surkis be permitted to serve his sentence only on weekends.
The prosecution is asking that all those probation conditions be applied to Surkis because he refuses any form of therapy and is not admitting the severity of his crimes, saying he was only drawn to child pornography out of curiosity.
The judge will render a decision on December 9.
