‘Something went horribly wrong’ as neighbours socialized, jury hears as murder trial opens

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This article was published 10/06/2019 (2280 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg woman accused of killing her Wolseley neighbour went on trial for murder Monday.

Brenda Schuff is charged with second-degree murder in the April 10, 2017 killing of 54-year-old Judy Kenny.

Prosecutors allege Kenny was outside looking for a friend’s dog when she met Schuff, who lived two doors away, for the first time.

The women returned to Kenny’s Camden Place home to socialize when “something went horribly wrong” and Schuff beat, stomped and stabbed Kenny to death, Crown attorney Debbie Buors said in an opening address to jurors.

Const. Susan Roy-Haegeman, a member of the Winnipeg Police Service identification unit, told jurors Kenny was found dead on the kitchen floor, naked from the waist up.

“It was readily apparent that she suffered significant injuries,” Roy-Haegeman said.

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Kenny had “significant stab wounds to the chest” and a large kitchen knife was “embedded” in her eye socket, she said.

Buors told jurors they will be shown a video statement later in the trial provided by a Japanese exchange student who was living with Kenny at the time of the killing.

Buors said the young woman was staying in a basement room at the time of the killing and called a student mentor, who called 911.

Jurors are also expected to hear evidence of what Schuff told police upon her arrest.

The trial is set for three weeks.

Dean Pritchard
Courts reporter

Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean.

Every piece of reporting Dean produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.