Police charge man in August slaying on Langside Street

Homicide detectives have charged a 53-year-old man with second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a 25-year-old in the West End this summer.

It was just before 1 a.m. on Aug. 29 when Winnipeg Police Service officers on patrol came across Melvin Catcheway Jr. unresponsive on Langside Street near Sargent Avenue.

Catcheway, who was from Lake St. Martin First Nation but lived in Winnipeg, was rushed to hospital, where he later died.

Detectives say Troy Donavan Bernier, who knew Catcheway, got into an altercation with the victim before he shot him.

Police arrested Bernier Friday and charged him with second-degree murder.

He was also charged on warrants for allegedly uttering threats to someone on Nov. 8 and multiple counts of failing to comply with probation in November and October. He was detained in custody.

About a month before the shooting, Bernier was released from custody on time served and a year of probation, after he pleaded guilty to assault, uttering threats and carrying a concealed weapon on July 31.

Bernier was to reside at the Behavioural Health Foundation in St. Norbert and take drug treatment programming for his addictions.

His lawyer, Martin Glazer, said his criminal actions were tied to his addictions. The lawyer said Bernier had fallen down a dark path after his brother’s death in 2022, with his depression leading him to drugs after a long period of abstinence from cocaine.

Glazer said his client was desperately seeking the help that the drug treatment centre could provide.

Crown prosecutor Caitlin MacDonald said the assault was committed in September 2024, when Bernier, then homeless, went to a Manitoba Housing complex on Kennedy Street with a group of people.

A security guard, who didn’t recognize Bernier, asked for his tenant card. Bernier spat in his face and called him racial slurs before fleeing.

With warrants out for his arrest, Bernier was spotted in the area of Ellen Street and Elgin Avenue in March. He was arrested and police found a knife concealed in his jacket, said MacDonald. Glazer told court Bernier was living at the Salvation Army at the time and carried the weapon for protection.

On May 17, Bernier threatened to kill his girlfriend when she tried to break up with him at her Main Street apartment. He was arrested a couple of hours later.

Court heard in July that Bernier has a serious record, with convictions for aggravated assault and break-and-enter from the 1990s and robbery and flight from police causing bodily harm in 2006, all in Alberta.

Glazer said those offences were also tied to cocaine use.

More recently, he pleaded guilty in 2015 for trying to bring drugs into a Manitoba corrections facility in 2013, records show. He was given a 40-month sentence.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca