Accused in 2017 killing had violent intent: Crown

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This article was published 02/10/2019 (2340 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When Cameron Bounthieng Kinnavanthong, Gene Lester Malcolm and Leon Edward Patchinose allegedly entered a Pritchard Avenue drug house June 18, 2017, armed with a gun and machete, violence was sure to follow, jurors were told Wednesday.

That one of the Winnipeg drug house’s occupants, William Sumner, would end up dead from a gunshot wound was a “foreseeable consequence,” said Crown attorney Libby Standil, who urged jurors in a closing address to find all three accused guilty of manslaughter.

Standil said the three men — who are also charged with aggravated assault in connection to a second victim, Richard Traverse — were united by a “common purpose,” namely to satisfy a drug debt and “assault whoever happened to be in that drug house that day.”

“They may not have all had their finger on the trigger at the time, but they each played a role in assisting the person who fired the fatal shot,” Standil said.

Jurors have heard testimony the co-accused were accompanied by two other men: Jonathan Erin Catcheway and a fifth man whose name is protected by a publication ban. Catcheway was the “motivating force” behind the attack and was armed with bear spray, Standil said.

Much of the evidence in the case came from the fifth man (who is not facing charges in connection with the killing and assault), who testified for the prosecution. The man testified he heard Malcolm say, “Shoot him in the leg, he can’t die like that,” and saw Kinnavanthong fire two shots. Malcolm, he said, fired one shot.

Sumner was shot once in the leg and once, fatally, in the hip, the shot travelling to his heart. Traverse was shot once in the thigh.

Kinnavanthong was identified as a suspect early in the investigation and provided a police statement in which he admitted he fired two shots in the drug house. Kinnavanthong claimed he fired the gun by accident after he was overcome by bear spray.

“My intentions weren’t to kill a man I don’t know,” Kinnavanthong said in a police interview video played for jurors.

“The whole room was full of f—-ing bear mace… I started to panic. I didn’t know what to do. I just shot… I didn’t even know if I shot him or not. Then I heard a guy died.”

Kinnavanthong’s lawyer urged jurors to reject the testimony of the fifth man, arguing nothing he said could be trusted.

“The Crown’s case is a garbage burger with unsavoury toppings,” Ian Histed told jurors. “Garbage is not a substitute for truth beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Lawyers for Patchinose and Malcolm urged jurors to acquit their clients, arguing but for the testimony of the fifth man, there was no reliable evidence to place them at the drug house at the time of the attacks.

The fifth man’s testimony was “soiled and untrustworthy,” said Malcolm’s lawyer, Tony Kavanagh. He argued the man only testified to “save his own skin.”

Jurors are expected to begin deliberations Thursday after receiving their final instructions from Justice Gerald Chartier.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca