Former Yellowknife city councillor testifies at his assault trial

WARNING: This story includes details of abuse.

A former Yellowknife city councillor who is on trial for assault testified in his own defence in court on Tuesday.

Robin Williams, who served on council from 2018 to 2022, is on trial for 14 charges of assault and sexual assault. He has pleaded not guilty to all of them.

All of the charges Williams is facing are alleged to have been committed against the same woman, whose identity is protected by a publication ban. The assaults are all alleged to have been committed between 2014 and late 2022.

During his testimony on Tuesday, Williams denied all of the accusations of assault and sexual assault.

He said the woman who is accusing him of assault is "addicted to alcohol" and said she was very intoxicated at the times when the assaults are alleged to have taken place.

He then went through the alleged assaults. 

Some, he told jurors, never happened, including an incident where he is alleged to have slammed the woman's head against a car window and another where he is alleged to have sexually assaulted her while she was unconscious. 

He described other events as happening very differently from what the Crown alleges.

The woman has testified that Williams broke her finger in 2014.

But Williams said during this incident, the woman was drinking heavily and had seized a knife and threatened to harm both herself and him with it. He said that her finger was broken while he attempted to seize the knife and de-escalate the situation. 

The woman has also testified that Williams spat chewing tobacco on her and dragged her by the hair in 2017. 

Williams also claimed his accuser was heavily intoxicated during that incident, and said he remembered spitting chewing tobacco on her accidentally, and then apologizing.

The trial will continue at N.W.T. Supreme Court on Wednesday.