Back to the ’80s

Serial arsonist gets more jail time, community ban

A serial arsonist who believes controlled burning is his “calling” was sentenced to nine months in jail and barred for two years from a southwestern Manitoba community after he deliberately set multiple grass fires during a fire ban in May.

Convicted harasser accused of targeting old, new victims, including judge

Agnieszka Ciochon-Newton, who was sentenced to six years in prison for mercilessly harassing two people she believed had wronged her, as well as other crimes, wasted no time when her sentence ended to launch fresh attacks on victims new and old, including the judge who convicted her, court documents allege.

The 58-year-old former nurse was arrested last month after Winnipeg police “became aware that (Ciochon-Newton) was engaging in aggressive and harassing behaviours again, starting almost immediately upon the expiry of her parole conditions” on May 13, Det. Sgt Kylie Case wrote in search warrant documents obtained by the Free Press.

Ciochon-Newton is charged with seven counts of criminal harassment, two counts of uttering threats and one count each of fraud, breaking and entering, attempting to obstruct justice, intimidation of a justice official, mischief and defamatory libel. She remains in custody.

Search warrant documents say provincial court Judge Keith Eyrikson learned in late August that Ciochon-Newton had emailed CBC Manitoba days earlier and threatened him.

Mayoral candidates share faves, test knowledge in Free Press culture quiz

It’s been said that politics is downwind of culture. However true that is, where politicians stand on hot-button cultural debates such as artificial intelligence, whether they prefer sports over arts and what local restaurants they patronize can offer a window into their sensibilities and outlooks.

The Free Press invited the four leading mayoral candidates among decided voters — according to a recent Abacus poll — to take part in a cultural quiz. (Kevin Klein, who was polling second, did not respond.) While most of the questions are lighthearted, they speak to some of the personalities behind the heated rivalries over budgets, buses, business taxation and beyond.

What was the last book you finished?

● Scott Gillingham: I’m almost done Winnipeg author Paul Vincent Jacuzzi’s book Blind Eyes. It’s a Dalton Drake novel.

Man pleads guilty to manslaughter for chasing, stabbing man downtown

An intellectually disabled man who drunkenly chased down a man he had been arguing with and fatally stabbed him in broad daylight admitted to manslaughter on Wednesday.

Matthew Gerald Tomack Pelletier, now 38, chased Ricky Dwayne Mancheese, 49, down Kennedy Street before stabbing him six times in front of his wife on the sidewalk between Sargent and Cumberland avenues, at about 11:50 a.m. on June 11, 2024.

Pelletier, who police arrested the next day, was charged with second-degree murder, but instead pleaded guilty to the lesser offence of manslaughter in front of Court of King’s Bench Justice Joan McKelvey on Wednesday.

“This type of incident on Winnipeg streets is all too common and must be strongly deterred,” said McKelvey.

City’s drug, homelessness crises overlooked on campaign trail, front-line groups say

Those on the front lines of coping with the city’s deepening homelessness and drug crises express concern at civic election candidates’ lack of attention to the issues

Proposed design for Carberry-area intersection includes overpass, roundabouts

The province has released a proposed design for an intersection near Carberry where a crash killed 17 seniors in 2023.

The project proposes an overpass and two roundabouts at the intersection of Highway 5 and the Trans-Canada Highway. Details and renderings of the design were released on the province’s website.

The overpass was announced in November’s throne speech and pegged at $100 million to construct. The province initially floated the idea of a restricted crossing U-turn, or RCUT, but the design was met with intense scrutiny from the public.

Residents said at the time the RCUT would be confusing for drivers and difficult to navigate.