Judge sentences man to 15 years for fatal 2023 shooting of young mother in ‘senseless act of violence’

A Winnipeg man who fatally shot a young mother in the back following an early morning drug deal has been sentenced to 15 years in prison in a plea bargain that spared him a possible life sentence for murder.

Brent Jayden Meade, 22, pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the Nov. 21, 2023, slaying of Ava Marie Zaber at her Burrows Avenue home.

Meade was originally charged with second-degree murder, a conviction for which comes with a minimum sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for at least 10 years.

There were no witnesses to the killing. Court heard weaknesses in the Crown’s case involving identifying Meade as Zaber’s killer could have resulted in his acquittal had the case gone to trial.

King’s Bench Justice Ken Champagne, addressing about a dozen of Zaber’s family members and friends who filled one side of the court gallery, said he hoped the plea bargain would bring them some “closure.”

“Certainty assists with closure,” Champagne said. “Even if he had a trial and Mr. Meade had been convicted, there is always a chance of error in a trial, and the matter goes to the Court of Appeal and the chance of the matter being sent back for another trial.”

Zaber’s family members and supporters stood up and left court en masse when Meade was provided a chance to speak, returning a minute later after he had finished. Later, after Meade had been sentenced, family members and supporters from both sides exchanged bitter words as they left the courtroom.

According to an agreed statement of facts provided to court, Zaber, 20, was at home with her partner and their four-year-old son at 1:22 a.m. when she answered a Facebook message from someone asking if she had any drugs to sell.

Zaber confirmed she did and provided the prospective buyer with her address.

Taxi security video showed Meade entering a taxi at 1:39 a.m. and being dropped off outside Zaber’s home at 1:41 a.m. He returned to the taxi two minutes later and it drove away.

What happened in those two intervening minutes wasn’t captured on security video.

“Meade is pleading guilty that he attended to the front door of (the house) and discharged a handgun one time at Zaber as she was climbing the interior stairs leading to her suite,” said Crown attorney Amanda Ennis.

“This (was) a senseless act of violence that just adds to the statistics of more murdered Indigenous women and the over incarceration of Indigenous people,” Ennis said.

Meade was arrested Dec. 6, 2023, at a home on the 500 block of College Avenue, five blocks north of where Zaber was shot.

Meade told the writer of a pre-sentence report that he had been drinking and using cocaine daily for six months prior to the killing and “was on the verge of being blacked out,” Ennis said.

“This mental state somewhat reduces his culpability,” she said.

According to the pre-sentence report, Meade said he remembered going to Zaber’s home, giving her money for drugs and “hearing a bang,” before returning to his taxi.

Police found a spent shell casing with no fingerprints on it at the bottom of the stairwell at Zaber’s home. The gun from which it was fired was never recovered.

Meade had an upbringing mired in domestic violence and drug use, and “had to fend for himself, much of the time,” said defence lawyer Tara Walker.

When his brother died from a drug overdose in 2017, Meade fell into a downward spiral “that led him down a path… that is very difficult to get out from,” Walker said.

Zaber’s family described her as a “beautiful soul” who was working hard to make a better life for herself and her young son.

“I awake most days and hope that it’s a dream,” said her brother BJ Smerechanski, reading from a prepared victim impact statement. Zaber’s death “has scarred our family and left a hole that will never be filled.”

Zaber “gave light to dim rooms,” said her niece Shayla Bogar-Rusnak in a victim impact statement read out by Crown attorney Theresa Cannon.

“Now she sits on a shelf in a metal ornament, lifeless and dull, the exact opposite of what her life was meant to be.”

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca