Guilty plea but no recollection of Canada Day stabbing of Ukrainian refugee

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This article was published 09/01/2024 (645 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The man who accepted responsibility for stabbing a Ukrainian refugee in the neck in a shocking Canada Day attack at The Forks was so intoxicated he doesn’t remember the incident, court was told.

On Monday, Jayden Kyle Martin, 21, pleaded guilty in front of provincial court Judge Julie Frederickson to one count of aggravated assault. Other charges were stayed.

On July 1, 2022, around 10:40 p.m., two men (then 22 and 23, respectively) who had fled Ukraine after the Russian invasion were walking near the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.

The pair later told witnesses they had accidentally bumped into a group of three men they did not know. Despite apologizing, the two refugees were attacked.

Winnipeg police said, at the time, the 22-year-old was bleeding profusely from a life-threatening stab wound. Staff at Health Sciences Centre stabilized him after he arrived in critical condition. His 23-year-old friend was treated for exposure to pepper spray and released.

“My client’s position on the matter is that he’s got no recollection about what transpired because of the amount of alcohol and Xanax which had been consumed,” Martin’s defence lawyer, Saheel Zaman, told Frederickson on Monday.

“The Crown’s position… is that my client is the person who had the knife and did the stabbing… Mr. Martin is not in a position to argue against that.”

During the brief hearing, Zaman told Frederickson of the facts of the case, which he described as beginning with an altercation between the two small groups.

“What ended up happening, one of the gentlemen was pepper sprayed, and in the course of some conversation, the complainant on the aggravated assault was stabbed in the neck area to the extent that the blade broke off and the blade remained in the complainant’s neck,” said Zaman.

“The police attend, they check a number of video surveillance evidence and they’re able to ascertain (the suspects) fled on a bus, and then there’s video on the bus of discussion between these individuals. One of them… is my client… Essentially, they’re making admissions, in terms of their involvement.”

Zaman told the judge his client is currently in custody at Headingley Correctional Centre, where he’s attending Winding River Therapeutic Community — a comprehensive alcohol and drug addiction program.

Frederickson ordered the completion of a pre-sentence report with Gladue components. A sentencing date will be set Feb. 2.

Zaman said he expects the Crown to seek a sentence of five to seven years; he intends to ask for “much less” time behind bars.

A witness who assisted the victims and later visited them in hospital told media the pair had arrived in Canada just two weeks earlier. They had moved into a downtown apartment the same day of the attack, the witness said.

In November, Tyson Cole Steven Bechard, 20, pleaded guilty in provincial court to one count of aggravated assault. He has not yet been sentenced, court records suggest.

It is unclear whether a teenage co-accused’s charges have yet been heard in youth court.

Meantime, the man accused in the Dec. 20 fatal stabbing of a Ukrainian refugee on a city street appeared in court Jan. 5.

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Ivan Rubanik, 46, who moved to Winnipeg with his family less than a year ago while fleeing the invasion of Ukraine, was walking to work in the morning when he was stabbed near Watt Street and Talbot Avenue in the Elmwood neighbourhood.

Ethan Richard Gladu, 19, has been charged with second-degree murder.

Gladu was on bail and facing assault and weapons charges stemming from alleged incidents in April and September last year, court records show.

At the time, a police spokesman said there was no indication Rubanik was attacked because he was a newcomer, describing the attack as a wrong-place-wrong-time scenario.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca

Erik Pindera
Reporter

Erik Pindera is a reporter for the Free Press, mostly focusing on crime and justice. The born-and-bred Winnipegger attended Red River College Polytechnic, wrote for the community newspaper in Kenora, Ont. and reported on television and radio in Winnipeg before joining the Free Press in 2020.  Read more about Erik.

Every piece of reporting Erik 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.