Sex assault charges against Brandon massage therapist rise to 20 - CBC.ca

[massage]

There are now 18 women who say they were sexually assaulted by a Brandon massage therapist, police say.

Michael Petrowski, 55, had already been charged with sexual assaults against 13 women when police on Thursday announced five more had come forward.


"I can't say what their reasoning is for each person to come forward, but I think in situations like these, when we do have somebody make that first step and make the report, it's possible that it makes it easier for others to disclose incidents as well," Brandon police spokesman Const. Myran Hamm said.

Petrowski was arrested on the additional charges on Wednesday and is scheduled to be in court on Feb. 27.

In total, he now has 20 charges of sexual assault against him, as two women reported multiple attacks, police said.

"It's an it's unknown to me how many people this individual's been in contact with, so there's always potential that there's still victims out there who are maybe reluctant to come forward or haven't come forward yet," Hamm said.

The investigation into Petrowski started in November 2019 when a woman said she was receiving a massage on Oct. 30 when the man made inappropriate sexual comments while also touching her in a sexual manner.

Not long after, a second woman came forward to report a similar incident.

Six more women came forward in December, independently of one another, to report similar occurrences they said occurred from February to August 2019.

Then police announced in late January that five more women added their names to the list.

Police have said Petrowski was working as an independent contractor at a business at the time of the alleged assaults.

 

[Ursus]

The women are lying.

If a woman is talking, good chance she is lying.