New details are emerging about the Canadian tourist charged with abducting and raping an 80-year-old grandmother with Alzheimer’s at a luxurious Bahamas resort.
Details of the Crime
Gordon Wilkie, 61, of New Waterford, Nova Scotia, was arrested and charged with rape in the shocking incident on January 28 at the Warwick Hotel Paradise Island Bahamas.
Wilkie is a faculty member at Novia Scotia Community College, where he specializes in renewable energy and has been placed on leave following his arrest.
‘It’s really hard to find exactly the right words, because in our minds, it is just beyond heinous,’ the victim’s son David Ahrens said in a phone interview on Friday. ‘It’s just the most horrendous scenario.’
Effort to Get Wilkie Arrested
Meanwhile, US Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Tom Justice, who happened to be staying at the same hotel, has emerged as a hero in the case, after he joined the search for the abducted woman and restrained Wilkie until he could be arrested by Bahamian police.
The alleged assault follows a US State Department travel advisory warning of a spike in murders in the Bahamas, and recent allegations from two Kentucky mothers who say they were raped by staff at Pirate’s Cove beach resort on Grand Bahama.
As it is
Wilkie is being held without bail in the Bahamas, and his attorney did not respond to a request to comment on the charges on Friday morning.
Stacey Baillie, a spokesperson for Novia Scotia Community College said in a statement: ‘We are aware of a case, currently before the courts in the Bahamas, involving very serious criminal charges against an employee.’
Baillie declined to comment on individual employees, citing privacy laws.
‘I can confirm that any employee facing serious criminal charges such as these would be placed on leave while the matter was before the courts and pending the results of an internal review,’ she added.
Wilkie runs a solar-power installation company and was an instructor in renewable energy at NSCC’s Dartmouth campus, according to a 2021 CBC News interview.
The victim in the Bahamas rape case is also Canadian, but her family has no connection to the accused assailant other than happening to stay in the same resort on their vacation.
Ahrens, who is publicly sharing his mother’s photo but requested that her name be withheld, said that the family is speaking out to demand ‘full justice’ for her, and warn others of the dangers to vulnerable family members.
According to Ahrens, who has launched a GoFundMe campaign to help cover medical and legal expenses for his mother, she had travelled with his sister on a short vacation in the Bahamas when the attack unfolded.
Ahrens said that his sister kept a close eye on their mother during the entire trip, but that the brazen abduction unfolded in a split second, when they became separated on an elevator.
