Clubs were for pretending to play golf, not hitting woman, says Levar

Gary Levar told a judge Monday he isn't a drug dealer, but he regularly gave drugs to young women, including the one who has accused him of drugging, sexually assaulting and torturing her In September 2017. 

"They fool around with me and do cocaine," the 49-year-old explained to prosecutor Heidi Mitchell, when he took the witness stand on the sixth day of his trial on 16 charges.

"That's what girls do when they come to my house," he said, during cross-examination by the Crown. "It's not sex, it is oral."

Mitchell asked "they give you oral sex and you give them cocaine?"

He responded "yes, at the same time." 

Levar testified the girls walked in off the street to his Patrick Street residence.

"They come knocking on my door," he said, adding "I wouldn't charge them for drugs, then I would be a drug dealer and I wouldn't sell to young girls."

Everyone who came there was addicted and he often gave them money - $50 or $100, he said.

"I didn't invite half of them. They just show up. They can sit there, do nothing and get high," he said, telling the court they "are not high-class girls that come over."

Levar has pleaded not guilty to charges of sexual assault, forcible confinement, administering a noxious substance, and several counts of assault with a weapon, including golf clubs, a spear gun, bat, torch, staple gun and hammer.

Levar said he has been doing drugs since 2012, but "It's only been cocaine and cocaine only" and never any other drug.

"I will not allow heroin in my house. All this heroin is killing people."

He told his lawyer Ken Walker that he never "sold crack in his life," but basically gave the complainant dope for free and money to go away, but also knew she would use it to buy heroin.

Levar said he had repeatedly told the complainant she wasn't welcome in his home, and admitted that in the three months prior to the alleged Sept. 29, 2017 incident that she had been there and slept there more than 25 times.

The complainant attracted the authorities to his residence earlier that month when she overdosed, he said.

She was taken to the hospital, but hours later she was back "banging on my door," and was told she wasn't allowed back.

"I didn't want her back. She'd overdosed at my house and the police came. I was on house arrest."

About two weeks later, he said he awoke about 10:30 a.m. on the 29th to the woman at his door, wanting drugs or money.

Levar said he didn't want her there and went upstairs, but later asked a male associate to get her out of there.

The complainant returned six or seven hours later, he again went to his bedroom to get away from her, leaving her downstairs.

"Whenever (the complainant) was in one of the rooms I left."

He testified that he thought she was trying to drug him when she brought him up a bottle of pop, because he doesn't keep pop in his house.

"I would not drink it," he told Superior Court Justice Edward Gareau, explaining he told her to drink it and she spilled it on the floor "which I thought was kind of rude."

As she was wiping it up with his sweater, she asked "what did you give me, what did you give me" and started to take her pants off," he said.

The woman was pulling at her hair, "stomped her feet and threw a tantrum," he said, telling the Crown "every time I ignored her it got worse."

"I knew she was trying to set me up and I got out of there."

He said he refused to give her drugs or money. "I guess she was sick. She was not acting like herself and I didn't want her there anyway."

Levar said he went downstairs and fell asleep on the couch while watching television.

The next morning he said he went upstairs to find the woman, wearing white panties and a bra, asleep on a chaise lounge in his room, woke her up and told her to put on her clothes.

The accused said she asked for a piece of crack. "I happened to have a piece there," she smoked it and went downstairs."

The door slammed and "she was gone."

Levar denied assaulting the woman with golf clubs, a torch, spear gun and staple gun - items that were his bedroom - during what the 21-year-old had described to the court as a night of "prolonged torture."

"I would never hit a woman." 

The torch, which was for soldering wires, didn't have any fluid in it, he insisted.

He was doing renovations to the room, and used the staple gun to put on the baseboards, Levar told the court.

He explained that the "brand new" golf clubs were in the room because he liked to play along when he watched golf on his 72-inch television.

Levar said he was pretending to play golf while he and another woman were watching the movie Tin Cup that night, telling Mitchell he was able to do that without hitting anything in the room.

A hammer, police found hanging on the headboard on his bed, had been there for two months, he said, insisting he never tried to hit the complainant with it.

He also denied putting MDMA in her drink, maintaining he doesn't even know what that drug is.

Mitchell will continue her cross-examination of the accused Tuesday.

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