Crown seeks eight years for 2020 road rage manslaughter

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This article was published 08/09/2023 (771 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Punched in the face during a heated roadside dispute, Rahim Ahmadzai acted not in fear but in anger when he fatally drove a utility knife into Ryan Kelly Legary’s chest, a judge was told Friday.

“While he professes to have been in fear of his life, the simple truth of the matter is that Rahim Ahmadzai… armed himself with the nearest weapon and got out of his car and stabbed the victim in an area that we all know will kill someone,” Crown attorney Ari Millo told King’s Bench Justice Candace Grammond.

Ahmadzai, 22, has pleaded guilty to manslaughter, admitting he stabbed 43-year-old Legary to death July 23, 2020, after a driving dispute and argument that escalated quickly in a Winnipeg parking lot shared by a Tim Hortons restaurant and Petro-Canada gas bar at Fermor Avenue and Lagimodiere Boulevard.

“I will never be able to erase the images of my son’s last few minutes,” Legary’s mother, Wendy McMillan, told court in an emotional victim impact statement. “When you stabbed my son, he had such a look of terror on his face, he lay dying by the gas pumps, he was struggling to breathe and bleeding to death.

“It wasn’t easy, it was torture, and I can never forgive you for doing that,” she said. “I lost my child.

“He is the first thing I think of in the morning and the last thing I think of at night. My heart is broken.”

Millo urged Grammond to sentence Ahmadzai to eight years in prison; defence lawyer Matt Raffey recommended a sentence of four years.

Ahmadzai pleaded guilty to the killing in March, two days into a scheduled nine-day trial.

Millo called Ahmadzai’s guilty plea an “acknowledgement of the inevitable,” in the face of a strong case that included DNA evidence placing him in a vehicle captured at the scene on security video and cellphone tower evidence placing him in the area at the time of the killing.

Legary was behind the wheel of his girlfriend’s Chevrolet Equinox at about 5:20 p.m., attempting to turn off Lagimodiere Boulevard and into the Tim Hortons parking lot at the same time Ahmadzai was in the passenger seat of a Nissan Cube registered to his sister, stopped behind a long line of cars in the opposing lane of traffic.

As Legary made a move to cross the opposite lane of traffic, the Cube pulled forward, blocking Legary from making the turn. Both men gestured and yelled profanities at each other, with Ahmadzai briefly exiting his vehicle before Legary squeezed through a hole in the traffic and made his way to the parking lot.

Ahmadzai’s vehicle followed Legary and parked directly beside him.

Security video captured Legary getting out of his vehicle and punching Ahmadzai in the face as he remained sitting in the passenger seat of his car.

Legary backed away and was continuing to gesture at Ahmadzai and his driver when Ahmadzai exited the Nissan with a utility knife and stabbed Legary once in the chest.

Legary walked backwards to the gas bar, where he collapsed next to one of the pumps.

Ahmadzai and his companion immediately drove away.

“Had (Ahmadzai) been one car back, this never would have happened,” Raffey said. “If (he) had been one car forward, it never would have happened.”

Raffey said the dispute escalated quickly and Ahmadzai “had no real time to reflect over his choices.” When Ahmadzai and his companion drove away, he was unaware how seriously Legary was injured, Raffey said.

Ahmadzai has no prior criminal record and drugs and alcohol played no role in the killing. A support letter provided to court by his employer described Ahmadzai as “respectful” and a “model employee.”

In a pre-sentence report prepared for court, Ahmadzai said he feared for his life and acted out of self-defence.

“If Mr. Ahmadzai was scared, all he had to do was close the (car) window and leave or not follow (Legary) into the parking lot,” Millo said. “Rahim Ahmadzai wasn’t scared, he was angry.”

Ahmadzai will return to court for sentencing Oct. 4.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca