Above: Ousmane Kader Diarrassouba has this image of Islamic dua multiple times. Lion of Islam.

Ottawa police release mugshots of wanted rapists believed to have fled Canada

Ottawa police have released mugshots of two convicted rapists believed to have fled the country while out on bail.

Police say they are hunting for international students Ousmane Kader Diarrassouba, 24, and Abdilahi Houd, 22, who were convicted on June 28 for the 2017 gang rape of a young Ottawa woman.

Convicted rapists walk out of Ottawa court, skip town and prison

Minutes after conviction, Ontario Court Justice Robert Fournier refused a Crown request to revoke their bail while they awaited sentencing. The judge also gave them 72 hours to surrender their passports at Ottawa police headquarters.

Diarrassouba and Houd, who have family in France and Africa, never turned in their passports and haven’t been seen since. They have so far eluded police, who until yesterday, had not issued a public release on the rapists now on the lam.

“We supported the successful prosecution of this case. We then conducted an investigation and search into their whereabouts when they did not appear for sentencing, while on bail conditions this summer. It is believed the two wanted men have fled Canada,” Ottawa police said in a statement to this newspaper.

Police are now working with law enforcement counterparts to track and return the convicted sex offenders, who were facing a penitentiary sentence.

It’s not unusual for those convicted of an offence to stay out of jail until their sentencing. Bail is automatically revoked only in cases of murder and other serious offences such as treason, sedition, piracy and intimidating Parliament.

Dominic Lamb, president of the Defence Counsel Association of Ottawa, acknowledged the Diarrassouba and Houd case looked “really bad” and might make it harder for other accused to get bail.

“It’s something that rubs us the wrong way, as it would for any member of the community,” Lamb said.

The public outcry over bail skippers can “bring the administration of justice into disrepute,” he said. “It’s going to be on the mind of other justices of the peace who are determining bail in those types of circumstances and it’s going to be heightened as a result of that.

“From the point of a view of trying to get people bail, these kind of cases can have an impact on the conditions imposed on bail and even getting bail itself.”

Police, meanwhile, have turned to the public for help, asking anyone with information on the whereabouts of Diarrassouba and Houd to contact them at 613-236-1222 or @crimestoppersOT.