Killer sentenced for second slaying, of woman he met at bus stop

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This article was published 12/05/2023 (897 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Winnipeg man has been sentenced for the second time in 15 years to a double-digit prison term for killing a woman.

Silas Ammaklak pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the July 2020 slaying of 35-year-old Danielle Harper and was sentenced Friday to 18 years in prison.

“Not only has Mr. Ammaklak showed himself to be a man prone to violence, he has showed himself to be unable or unwilling to take steps to reduce his risk to reoffend and unable or unwilling to control his violent impulses,” said King’s Bench Justice Sadie Bond.

Ammaklak, 53, stood trial for second-degree murder in Harper’s death, but after four months of stop-and-start testimony, he agreed to enter a plea to manslaughter. Ammaklak entered his plea to the lesser charge on the understanding he did not intend to kill Harper, but that his actions “contributed” to her death.

It was impossible to determine an exact cause of death because Harper’s body was in such a state of decomposition when it was found in Ammaklak’s Manitoba Avenue apartment on July 24, 2020, a pathologist testified in December.

Harper was stabbed five times in the chest and lower body, but those injuries were not fatal, court was told.

The body was unrecognizable and initially believed to be that of Ammaklak when it was discovered by the apartment owner 10 days after Harper was reported missing from her home at New Directions supportive housing.

Much of the Crown’s case against Ammaklak was built on his police statement.

Ammaklak told police he met Harper at a bus shelter at Main Street and Higgins Avenue, at which time she shared some alcohol with him before the two took a bus to his apartment.

Ammaklak provided investigators with a shifting version of events, including a claim he and Harper were followed to his home by two men, one of them armed with a bat, before admitting he had lied.

Ammaklak said he made lunch for Harper and the two drank from bottles of vodka and beer Harper had brought. Ammaklak said Harper wanted to have sex, but he couldn’t maintain an erection. Sometime later, he said, he heard “whispering” voices telling him to pick up his pocketknife from a coffee table and stab Harper.

Ammaklak said he stabbed Harper three times and then covered her mouth and nose with his hand until she stopped breathing. He said he grabbed a backpack, fled the apartment and did not return before his arrest.

Ammaklak said he only heard the “evil” voice when he had been drinking.

He was diagnosed with schizophrenia several years ago, but there was no credible evidence before the court that the illness had played a role in the killing, Bond said.

“There is no credible explanation for his assault on (Harper),” she said.

In 2008, Ammaklak pleaded guilty in Nunavut to manslaughter in the 2003 beating death of his wife, Susan Natar, and was sentenced to 13 years in prison.

Court was told Ammaklak punched and kicked 29-year-old Natar and threw her off a balcony, before dragging her back into her home and beating her to death with a piece of walrus cartilage.

Bond said Ammaklak was not to be resentenced on his violent prior record, but noted his earlier manslaughter conviction did nothing to change his behaviour.

“He knew that in the past that while in a state of intoxication he had killed a woman by violently assaulting her (and) continued to consume intoxicating substances,” Bond said.

“The consequences for Ms Harper and her family are devastating. The risk to the public posed by Mr. Ammaklak is obvious.”

Ammaklak received credit for time served, reducing his remaining sentence to just under 14 years.

Bond ordered that he serve half his sentence before being able to apply for parole.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca