‘I feel like he did it’: mom of accused tells murder trial

The mother of a man accused of shooting five people dead inside a Langside Street drug house told police she believed he was guilty and that she “need(ed) to get him off the street,” jurors were told Thursday.

“I feel like he did it,” Mary Felix said in a statement provided to Winnipeg police on Nov. 30, 2023, four days after her son Jamie Felix was accused of fatally shooting Crystal Beardy, 34; her sister Stephanie Beardy, 33; Melelek Lesikel, 29; Dylan Lavallee, 41; and Shawn Marko, 56.

Jamie Felix, 35, has pleaded not guilty to five counts of second-degree murder.

Prosecutors allege Felix had spent days smoking crack and drinking at the drug house and was in the company of his father, Randolph “Chummy” Fagnan, when Fagnan provided Felix with a loaded handgun that he used to shoot the victims.

Court heard Fagnan was gang-involved and had recently died.

Mary Felix and Fagnan separated when Jamie was about three years old, Mary testified.

Mary Felix said she reached out to her son over social media after being alerted to the shootings by Fagnan’s sister.

“Hello Jaime. Are you OK?” Mary asked Jaime in a Nov. 27 message over Facebook Messenger. “How are you doing? Talk to me please.”

“I’m OK,” a person Mary believed to be Jaime said in reply.

Mary asked Jaime what he did that weekend.

“Drink and drugs,” he said.

“You’re spending money on drugs and alcohol?” Mary replied. “Why? Why? Supposed to stay sober. What’s going on Jaime? Talk to me.”

“I’m OK and safe,” Jaime said. “All you need to know.”

In a message that was ultimately unsent, Mary said she asked Jaime “if he was at that place at Langside.”

In another message that same day, Jaime said: “Unfortunately, I’m not going to be around for long, Mom… I’m hurt, I’m full of pain.”

Two days later, Jaime told his mother he was “gonna be going out to the fullest.”

“What does that mean?” Mary said.

“Just have fun till they come to me ,” Jaime said.

Defence lawyer Ted Mariash accused Mary Felix of trying to wring a confession from her son, and suggested she had no proof it was Jamie she had been exchanging messages with on Facebook.

“During your police statement you said repeatedly you feel he is guilty” and “used the words ‘mother’s intuition’ twice during that conversation,” Mariash said. “You co-operated with police because you assumed he was guilty.”

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In earlier testimony, Mary said Jaime spiralled into substance abuse following the murder of his twin brother Johnathen Felix when he was 21.

“Losing a family member causes a lot of trauma… I guess you just want to forget,” she said.

Mary said Johnathen was with his father when he was murdered, something she did not believe Jamie knew at the time.

Mary said Jamie takes medication for seizures and was aware he should not mix it with drugs and alcohol.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca

Dean Pritchard
Courts reporter

Dean Pritchard is courts reporter for the Free Press. He has covered the justice system since 1999, working for the Brandon Sun and Winnipeg Sun before joining the Free Press in 2019. Read more about Dean.

Every piece of reporting Dean 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.