Crown seeks 6-year sentence for Winnipeg magician, educator on child pornography charges

A Winnipeg magician and former educator who pleaded guilty to two counts of child pornography earlier this year may face up to six years in prison.

Daniel Kamenicky, 39, listened Monday as prosecutor Shannon Benevides told court the Crown was seeking a six-year prison sentence for Kamenicky for making and possessing child pornography.

Court heard Kamenicky, whose stage name was "Dan the Magic Man," took advantage of his numerous jobs with children to surreptitiously record and take pictures of them at the schools he worked for, during magic shows, in public parks and on playgrounds.

Most of the videos and images were of girls between the ages of eight and 10 and focused on their genital areas, both clothed and not. The videos were taken without the girls' awareness and Kamenicky used his magician skills to distract them, said Benevides.

Made 33 videos

In one video played for the court, the high-pitched creaks of a swing set could be heard in the background as Kamenicky encouraged girls wearing dresses to play on the monkey bars.

"OK, who can hang upside down the longest?" he can be heard asking on the video while recording the children. 

In another video, court was told pulsating techno music with sexually suggestive lyrics played under images of kids at a splash pad.

Kamenicky admitted to making 33 videos in all. 

Winnipeg police were made aware of the images and videos when Kamenicky got a new cellphone, which automatically uploaded a series of images and videos to his Flickr account.

Yahoo, which owns Flickr, notified the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children in the U.S. Using Kamenicky's IP address, the centre tracked down his location and notified the Winnipeg Police Service's child exploitation unit.

"So it wasn't his intention, as far as we are aware, to actually distribute it, but it's still an aggravating factor that distribution occurred, especially considering it's a risk one takes when making and possessing child pornography," said Benevides.

Winnipeg police raided his home last August. Between two computers and two cellphones, they found 53 pornographic images of children and 50 videos, 17 of which were downloaded.

"Of note was there were 11,144 'child other' images located in the digital evidence," said Benevides.

"Now what I can tell the court about that is that some of these were innocent … however, there were many surreptitious recordings in a school setting, at magic shows, in stores, at restaurants and other public places." 

School division notified: co-worker

Kamenicky had been employed as an educational assistant at Windsor School, a kindergarten to Grade 8 school in Elm Park, until he was arrested.

He had also worked as a "part-time, casual service provider" for Manitoba's Department of Families, a provincial spokesperson told CBC earlier this year, and had worked for the University of Manitoba with the Mini U program. 

A statement presented in court from a Windsor School co-worker indicated she had noticed Kamenicky taking videos and images of children and confronted him on his behaviour.

She told Kamenicky she would report his behaviour and said she did so three times to the Louis Riel School Division's student support services and three times to Windsor School's principal. 

Kamenicky was initially charged on Aug. 24, 2016. After his arrest, a provincial spokesperson told CBC background checks on Kamenicky had been done before he began a part-time job working with youth and came back clear.

He was immediately suspended after being arrested.

Officials with the University of Manitoba and the Louis Riel School Division said in 2016 he was suspended and background checks both organizations commissioned came back clear.​

Statements from parents

Benevides read statements in court from parents of children who were videotaped by Kamenicky. "She was in a safe place, or supposed to be safe. It's not anymore," said one.

"We worry that there are more photos of our daughter out there in cyberspace, and … of what context?" reads another. "We're told we will never truly know. We worry this will come back to her at some point and create challenges for dealing with authority figures, or other men in general.… How much is the worry worth?"

A representative for the Louis Riel School Division could not be immediately reached.

A continuation date for the sentencing hearing has yet to be scheduled to allow defence attorney Dan Manning to present his argument.

Manning said the six-year sentence the Crown is seeking is too high and the defence will ask for a sentence closer to the minimum of two years.

Behaviour that isn't overtly sexual 'minimized'

Noni Classen, director of education at the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, said educators often aren't sure what to do with complaints when the offending behaviour isn't overtly sexual.

"Administrators and educators know what to do when things are black and white, but when it's in that grey area ... what ends up happening is there isn't a lot of training around how abuse happens, how it's built up," Classen said.

"These behaviours get minimized because they don't understand the risk associated with behaviour that isn't inherently sexual in nature.

"The key is to mitigate risk around high-risk behaviour," she said. "It needs to be brought to their attention, it needs to be responded to, to be corrected and to be documented."

Classen said if an educator doesn't get the response they are hoping for from their immediate supervisor, they should escalate it to the superintendent and then the school board if needed.