OTTAWA \u2014 Former Afghanistan hostage Joshua Boyle, who faces several assault charges, will be released from jail with strict bail conditions that include an electronic tracking bracelet.<\/p>\n
Ontario Court Justice Robert Wadden handed down the decision Friday in Ottawa after three days of proceedings.<\/p>\n
Under the release conditions, Boyle will live with his parents, Patrick and Linda, in Smiths Falls, Ont. \u2014 effectively under house arrest \u2014 and wear a GPS ankle bracelet that can track his movements.<\/p>\n
Boyle and each of his parents must post a $10,000 bond. Patrick and Linda will serve as sureties and one of them must accompany their son if he leaves the property.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey’re all pleased that Joshua’s going to be coming home,\u201d said Lawrence Greenspon, a lawyer for Boyle.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully the release will happen this weekend. More than likely I think it’d be Monday.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boyle will be allowed to visit Ottawa with one of his parents only to see a doctor, consult his lawyers or to attend court. He must continue receiving psychiatric treatment and cannot possess a weapon or use the internet.<\/p>\n
Boyle and his American wife, Caitlan Coleman, were taken hostage in 2012 by a Taliban-linked group while on a backpacking trip in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
The couple \u2014 along with the three children they had during five years in captivity \u2014 were freed by Pakistani forces last October.<\/p>\n
Boyle was arrested by Ottawa police in December and charged with offences including assault, sexual assault, unlawful confinement and causing someone to take a noxious substance.<\/p>\n
The charges against Boyle relate to two alleged victims, but a court order prohibits the publication of any details that might identify them or any witnesses.<\/p>\n
None of the charges, which relate to incidents that allegedly occurred after Boyle returned to Canada, has been tested in court. A trial date is slated to be set on June 15, when Boyle is due back in court.<\/p>\n
Evidence from the bail proceeding and Wadden’s reasons, delivered from the bench on Friday, are also covered by a publication ban.<\/p>\n
Boyle, his wife, and children had been living in an Ottawa apartment when he was arrested.<\/p>\n
An initial evaluation found him fit to stand trial, but he underwent a fuller assessment at a mental health centre in Brockville, Ont. The confidential psychiatric assessment was completed this spring.<\/p>\n
Boyle attended high school in Kitchener, Ont., and earned a degree from the University of Waterloo in 2005.<\/p>\n
He was briefly married to Zaynab Khadr, sister of Toronto-born Omar Khadr, who spent years in a U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after being captured in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
In 2011 Boyle married Coleman, who was raised in Pennsylvania, during a lengthy trip the pair took to South America.<\/p>\n
The following year, they set off for Russia and traveled through Central Asia for several months, winding up in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
The family’s dramatic rescue last October made global headlines, and even led to a meeting on Parliament Hill with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
OTTAWA \u2014 Former Afghanistan hostage Joshua Boyle, who faces several assault charges, will be released from jail with strict bail …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":109516,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[3676,27522],"class_list":["post-165850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-bail","tag-joshua-boyle","mauthors-jim-bronskill","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}