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Her statement of claim, filed last summer, said the “heinous” assaults by Seamons “were allowed to commence and continue because of the negligence and breaches” by the Durham Regional Police Service Board (DRPSB).

Now, in a statement of defence filed in court last month, the board denied all claims, adding it “specifically denies that there was any failure to take any required action in relation to Seamons.”

Seamons, in his own statement of defence served last week, said the woman fabricated allegations of sexual assault and said an internal police investigation that led to his firing had nothing to do with allegations of assault.

After the lawsuit was filed last year, the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) reopened their sexual assault investigation in the case after new information was provided by Durham Police. The outcome of that investigation is still pending.

In 2003, the woman’s lawsuit claims, she took her mother’s credit card without permission and her parents took her to their local police station in Bowmanville to “attempt to teach her a lesson.” The Star is not naming the woman because she is an alleged victim of sexual assault.

There, she met Seamons, and the assaults, she claimed, began immediately. Seamons held her for hours in an interrogation room, the claim alleges, where he told her to “remove her pants, lay across his lap, bottomless, and threatened to spank her.”

Afterwards, she was returned to her parents without charges. From then on, the claim alleges, Seamons “developed an inappropriate and intense interest” in the girl.

“Over the course of the next eight months, Seamons exploited his position as a police officer and used the implicit trust, authority, and power that corresponded with being a police officer to become close to (the girl) and her family and to groom, manipulate, stalk and prey upon (the girl),” the claim read.

This manifested, the claim alleges, in Seamons picking the girl up and driving her around in his police car, “randomly” calling and visiting her family home while on duty, and multiple instances of sexual assault that are described in detail in the claim — including instances in his patrol car.

After the girl’s mother learned of the alleged assaults, she confronted her daughter, the claim alleged. It goes on to say that the girl, afraid of what the officer would do, only disclosed that Seamons had allegedly spanked her.

The mother took the girl to report the alleged assault to Durham Police and later the SIU.

The claim said the girl provided as many as five statements during the course of those investigations but was not offered access to a lawyer or support person, nor was a guardian present. Because of the “extreme fear, shame, guilt, and coercion” by the police officers interviewing her, the claim alleged, she never disclosed the full extent of the allegations. No criminal charges were ever laid.

But the service continued with an internal investigation against Seamons concerning his relationship with the teen. While suspended during the SIU investigation, according to a public appeal decision, Seamons’ locker was searched and nine pornographic photos the officer had taken from a woman’s bedroom during a domestic violence investigation were found.

Seamons was charged with twenty non-criminal offences of misconduct. He would eventually plead guilty to half of them related to both the teen girl and the photographs, admitting to holding the teen girl the night her parents brought her to the station without documenting the interview, attending her family home “on numerous occasions” and taking her in his squad car without notifying dispatch or documenting her transport, among other misconduct.

“If details of the allegations against Constable Seamons were made known to the public, the damage to the reputation of the Durham Regional Police Service would be huge,” wrote Supt. Robert Chapman, the hearing officer who decided the case in 2006.

Seamons was fired.

Seamons appealed the decision, his lawyer arguing his interactions with the girl were a “type of community interaction consistent with the Service’s core values,” according to that decision, which denied the appeal.

The Ontario Civilian Police Commission wrote at the time: “It was noted that while Constable Seamons spent a significant amount of his personal time counselling (the girl) he never claimed overtime for his efforts.”

The woman, in her lawsuit, claimed the police service didn’t do enough to protect her from harm.

In the board’s short statement, they denied liability for any harm, instead filing a cross-claim against Seamons for any damages awarded to the woman and its own costs defending against the lawsuit.

Seamons, in his statement of defence, alleged the claims were “thoroughly” investigated by the SIU, saying some of the allegations raised in her lawsuit were not made at that time and questioned those new allegations being brought now.

“In 2003, despite her age, the Plaintiff was a headstrong and independent individual who had no qualms about challenging authority figures in her life,” the statement read.

He alleged the teen saw him “as an extension of her parents’ attempts to control her” and that she made “false complaints” to prevent the officer from checking up on her.

“The new sexual assault allegations of the Plaintiff in the Claim are scandalous, vexatious, malicious and false and are purely financially motivated,” the statement of defence said.

Seamons also filed a cross claim saying it is the Durham Police board not him who should be responsible for any damages as well as costs.

He also filed a counter claim against the woman alleging she defamed him in an article about her case previously published in the Star.