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Child kidnapper and rapist released to halfway house in Okanagan

Brian Abrosimo abducted an 11-year-old Langley girl in 2004
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Two years after the B.C. parole board deemed Brian Abrosimo too dangerous to be released from jail, he is now living in a halfway house.

According to a Parole Board of Canada document, Abrosimo’s request to reside at a community residential facility (CRF) in the Okanagan was accepted.

“Ultimately you would like to reside in a CRF in the Central Interior as you have indicated having family supports in the area,” the document reads.

On Aug. 22, Abrosimo, who is now 54, was granted one-chance statutory release to live in a halfway house in an undisclosed location, under special conditions.

Abrosimo has a curfew of 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. and is allowed to go outside the home unsupervised for one-hour increments. He is not to go near his victims and is prohibited from being in the Langley and Abbotsford areas.

The “one-chance” portion of his release means that should Abrosimo do something to violate the conditions of his release he will have to serve his full sentence, meaning he would remain incarcerated until his full release date in 2020.

In 2006, Abrosimo was sentenced to 14 years in prison, followed by a 10-year supervision order for abducting an 11-year-old Langley girl from a rural Aldergrove road two years earlier.

In August 2004, he used his van to knock down two children who were riding bicycles along 256 Street, kidnapping the 11-year-old girl, taping her eyes and mouth and driving her to Surrey where he sexually assaulted her.

She managed to get out of the van and run to a nearby home.

Her friend was left behind in a ditch with cuts, bruises and a broken wrist.

Abrosimo was also convicted of handcuffing and gagging a sex-trade worker before violently assaulting and raping her the month prior to the abduction of the Langley girl.

The girl’s family attended the hearing on Aug. 22, where her dad urged the parole board to keep Abrosimo behind bars forever.

This was the second time in two years, the family has attended a hearing.

The victim’s dad said if Abrosimo is released he should not be able to go near Langley or Abbotsford.

In his release conditions, that is one of the requirements.

In the many victim impact statements made, it was learned that the girl suffers mentally and physically from the attack and has lost her sense of trust.

The other girl Abrosimo hit with his van suffers extreme neck and back pain.

On 2015, the parole board voted to detain Abrosimo until the end of his sentence in 2020, concluding that “there is no supervision programs that would protect the community adequately from the risk that you present at this time.”

Prior to abducting the girl he had altered the appearance of his van and placed a mattress inside it. There were handcuffs, bolt cutters and a handgun in the van at the time of the kidnapping.

Prior to the crime, he frequented crack houses, exchanging money for sex.

Abrosimo’s criminal history dates back to 1986 and includes impaired driving, making threats and using violence to gain compliance from victims.

In 1992, he gagged and raped his former girlfriend. At one point, her children were present.

Abrosimo was convicted of that crime in 1995 and received a two-year sentence. After being released on full parole a year later, he was arrested for firing a gun multiple times at a man. In 2003, while high on drugs, he threatened to shoot a police officer and himself. He claimed to have a gun but was, in fact, in possession of a stapler.

In 2004, before the kidnapping and sexual assault of the Langley girl, he went to the home of his ex-wife and assaulted her, allegedly attempting to rape her again.

Abrosimo suffered a brain injury during a jail riot in 2008. But since birth, he has had limited cognitive abilities and low intelligence.

Since his last hearing in 2015, the board said that Abrosimo has made efforts to understand the risk he poses and how to manage that.

He recognizes that he has an extreme addiction issues, and was using meth at the time of the attacks.

Recent urine samples show he isn’t using drugs, said the report. However, he did attack an inmate in 2013.

monique@langleytimes.com



Monique Tamminga

About the Author: Monique Tamminga

Monique brings 20 years of award-winning journalism experience to the role of editor at the Penticton Western News. Of those years, 17 were spent working as a senior reporter and acting editor with the Langley Advance Times.
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