Human trafficking trial in Rosetown moves to June oral arguments

By Ian MacKay

Lawyers are scheduled to make oral arguments on June 3 in Saskatoon in a human trafficking and sexual assault trial that has unfolded in Rosetown over the last year and a half.

A Jan. 13 session of the trial involving Mohammad Masum and Sohel Haider was to have occurred at the Elks hall. However Masum’s defender cancelled an appearance by his final witness, Judge Miguel Martinez said last week.

The lawyers are to file documents supporting their positions with Judge Martinez by March 13, lawyers agreed during the Feb. 12 provincial court session here.

Saskatchewan RCMP charged Masum and Haider in June 2023 with human trafficking a Bangladeshi woman. The woman arrived in Gull Lake to work in Haider’s restaurant in October 2022. Police say she later worked for Masum in a Tisdale café before going to Elrose in March 2023.

She’d made arrangements involving MLA Doug Steele and a newcomer support worker in Tisdale to get spirited out of Elrose after about two days there. The woman, whose identity is protected by a publication ban, was taken to a safe house in Swift Current.

Masum also faces three charges of sexually assaulting the woman. He denied those accusations on the witness stand in late November and said he’d never employed her, only housed and fed her at Haider’s request.