The CBC News reporter who was kissed on the cheek by a shirtless stranger at last weekend’s Squamish Valley Music Festival has accepted his apology.
Megan Batchelor said the 17-year-old contacted her on Twitter Monday and sounded sincerely regretful for what he did.
According to the CBC, the teenager said he was trying to be funny but has come to realize it was wrong to kiss Batchelor without her consent while she was doing her job.
“It’s exactly what I wanted to hear,” Batchelor told the station. “I didn’t want anyone to lose their job or get a criminal record, I just want people to take a second and just think of the impact.”
Reaction to the highly-publicized kiss has been split on social media, with many lashing out at the reporter for filing an RCMP report about the incident.
Paul Doroshenko, a criminal defence lawyer in Vancouver, said Batchelor’s response was entirely appropriate, and arguably a necessary step to curbing this kind of behaviour.
“It’s non-consensual touching – that constitutes an assault,” Doroshenko told CTV News. “We have to deter people from doing it. If we just let people get away with this we’re not deterring anybody.”
Doroshenko said a criminal conviction would have been unlikely in a case like this, particularly if the teenager doesn’t have a record, but he’s glad the boy apologized and hopes others will think twice before trying a similar stunt.
Batchelor wasn’t the only one accosted at the festival – CTV’s Julie Nolin was fondled live on the air the same day. One girl hugged Nolin and another grabbed her buttocks.
Both incidents follow a disturbing trend of young men shouting vulgar phrases at TV reporters, most of whom have been women, while they’re live on the air.
