Killers fuelled by bad blood plead guilty

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A St. Norbert man who was slain in his home had been in a feud with one of his killers that escalated when they started dating each other’s ex-girlfriends, a court heard this week.

Salah Falah Hasan, 59, died after he was shot in his home on the 200 block of Houde Drive, on July 3, 2022.

On Tuesday, what was to be the first day of a five-week jury trial, Mohamad Alzreik, 28, and co-accused David Grant Wall, 40, pleaded guilty to manslaughter for their roles in the killing, while a third accused, Jeffrey William Frame, 44, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.

Court heard the three men drove to St. Norbert in a Hyundai Santa Fe, with Wall at the wheel, around 3 a.m. They were armed with two handguns.

“The feud that propelled that vehicle forward — the ongoing violence between Mohamad Alzreik and Salah Hasan — had been building for months and had escalated in the weeks preceding the shooting when (they) became involved with each other’s ex-girlfriends,” Crown attorney Ari Millo told King’s Bench Justice Herbert Rempel.

The reason for the original feud was not detailed in court.

“The bad blood that had simmered in the months preceding Hasan’s death had escalated from a personal rivalry, replete with crude exchanges, competing threats and mutual challenges,” Millo said.

Two weeks prior to the killing, Hasan had used bear spray to repel a violent attack outside his home.

Millo said the killers circled the house five times before Frame and one of the other men, each armed with a handgun, got out of the vehicle, and forced their way through the front door.

“The two gunmen then, without hesitation, opened fire,” Millo said. “Hasan attempted to confront his attackers as the final shots echoed from the shadows, and he collapsed at the threshold of his door, unable to take another step.”

Hasan was shot three times, including once in the heart.

Crown and defence lawyers have jointly recommended Alzreik, Wall and Frame be sentenced to 14 years, six years and life in prison with no chance of parole for at least 14 years, respectively.

Frame admitted to being one of the shooters, but proving the identity of the second shooter could have been uncertain had the matter gone to trial, Millo said.

“We would have argued at trial that Mohamad Alzreik was the second shooter, but we couldn’t discount the possibility that the jury would find otherwise, and the guilty plea is being entered on that exigency,” Millo said.

Alzreik, Wall and Frame will be sentenced Dec. 13.

At the time of the killing, an area resident told the Free Press Hasan had been stabbed and had his tires slashed earlier in the year and feared he was being targeted.

Court records showed Hasan and his killers all had criminal records; Hasan and Alzreik both faced possible deportation for prior offences.

Hasan was convicted in 2004 of one count of sexual interference involving a minor and sentenced to the equivalent of three years in prison.

In June 2014, Hasan was fined $800 after failing to report to the national sex-offender registry. Hasan’s lawyer told court at the time Hasan had been sick and didn’t bother to report because he believed he was about to be deported to his native Iraq.

Alzreik, a Syrian refugee, with four young children, was to face possible deportation proceedings after completing a 22-month jail stint for drug trafficking, court heard at his June 2020 sentencing hearing.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca