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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Victim's mom relives shootings

Gunman, pal invaded son's party, jury told

By: Aldo Santin

Posted: 09/14/2012 1:00 AM

Police investigate after a shotgun-wielding gunman shot dead two teens at a house party in December 2009. JOE.BRYKSA@FREEPRESS.MB.CA Local- (See MArtin story)-A Tyndall Park man is in critical condition after suffering injuries��to his upper body��in a suspected domestic incident just before noon. Police are on the scene at a house on Kinver Avenue, about two blocks west of Keewatin Street Saturday afternoon.- JOE BRYKSA/WINNIPEG FREE PRESS- Dec 05, 2009 (JOE BRYKSA / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS ARCHIVES) Photo Store

An Elmwood woman told a murder trial Thursday a party thrown by her son at their home in December 2009 was uneventful until two men burst in and started firing a shotgun, leaving her son and his friend dead.

Crystal Lynn Irvine, 38, said the night erupted into chaos, with the sound of gunfire and young people screaming.

Minutes later, Irvine's son, Tyler (TJ) Hawula, and his friend, Matthew Reynolds, both 18, were lying dead on the kitchen floor. A third boy, 17, was wounded. The shooter and someone with him ran out the front door.

"The front door was kicked in and I heard someone scream something like, 'So you been... with my homies,' " Irvine said as she calmly recounted the incidents from almost three years ago. "Then I heard the ch-ch-boom, ch-ch-boom in the kitchen.

"A man with a shotgun came into the living room. I chased my youngest (son) up the stairs and the (shooter) just panned the room with the shotgun and then fired again and shot (another friend of her son's).

"It all happened in a matter of seconds," Irvine said. "I started yelling at them, to get the... out. They turned and ran out the front door."

Irvine said she followed the shooter and his companion through her kitchen and as she did, she saw two bodies lying on the floor. She raced outside hoping to see where the shooter and his companion went, then went back inside.

Irvine said she then realized her son and his friend had been shot.

Two people are on trial, charged with two counts of first-degree murder and attempted murder for the shootings, which took place just after midnight on Dec. 5, 2009. Their names can't be published because they were 16 and 17 at the time.

It's alleged both accused are members of the M.O.B. street gang and were looking for revenge after one of them was kicked out of the party.

A third youth has been charged with first-degree murder and is being tried separately. An adult co-accused, Cody Delorme, pleaded guilty to reduced charges of manslaughter and was sentenced to 11 years in prison for his role in the shooting.

Irvine said there were about 20 to 23 young people in the house that night, most of them friends and cousins of her son, and she knew them well.

They had been drinking and smoking pot, she said, but there were no signs of trouble before the shooting began.

A second witness who testified Thursday said he was in the kitchen with Hawula and Reynolds and a few other people when the gunman burst into the house, yelled something at them and began firing, shooting Reynolds first, then Hawula.

"I didn't think it was real," the witness said. "Everybody was freaking out."

After shooting the first two young men, the shooter walked into the living room and fired another shot, the witness said, adding he didn't know a third person had been hit.

The witness said it was clear Reynolds had died instantly. Hawula was still alive but gravely wounded in the stomach.

"I held TJ, but he said he wasn't going to make it."

The trial continues.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 14, 2012 A8