Teen jailed for ‘brutal’ attack

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This article was published 10/09/2010 (5691 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A 19-year-old Brandon man will spend 30 months behind bars for his role in seriously wounding a man he struck in the head with a baseball bat.

Moments before Judge John Combs announced his sentence, the accused, Ashton Fleury, apologized to the victim and his family, who were sitting in the courtroom.

"I realize what I have done … I would change it if I could," he said, while glancing over at the family in the front row. "I’ve learned a lot about myself and my problems … I want to keep on that track … so that when I’m released, nothing like this ever happens again."

Crown attorney Grant Hughes sought three years in custody, noting that Fleury’s probation officer saw the young man as an extremely high risk to re-offend.

Defence attorney Bob Harrison sought 24 to 30 months custody, and credit for time served since March. Harrison argued that the time in custody has been a wake-up call for Fleury, adding that the offence was a first on his adult record.

Combs, however, said the "brutal" nature of the assault compelled him to sentence Fleury in a manner that would deter others from taking such a violent approach.

Aggravated assault carries a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison.

On March 20, police were called to the 2200-block of Ninth Street at 1:37 a.m. There, they found blood on the driveway and the victim, who’s in his mid-40s, sitting beside his garage.

Investigators learned that a group of young adults, friends of the victim’s daughter, had been partying at the home.

A group of males arrived around 1:30 a.m., wanting to enter the home to "deal with" a number of the party-goers. The victim wouldn’t let the group inside his home and asked them to leave, but the intruders refused.

During the ensuing confrontation in the driveway, the victim grabbed a snow shovel to protect himself, but Fleury hit him in the head with a baseball bat.

The stricken man was taken to Brandon hospital and then transferred to the intensive care unit at the Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg. The victim suffered extensive brain injuries, a 10-centimetre fracture to his skull and numerous contusions.

In a victim impact statement read by the victim’s wife in court yesterday, she described how that fateful night, which also happened to be her husband’s birthday, has turned their family’s world upside-down.

Today, the victim is gradually returning to work, but still suffers from residual effects of the attack, including a risk of seizures, delayed response time and an impaired sense of smell and taste.

Fleury was in violation of a curfew at the time of the assault, court heard.

On Jan. 5, police caught him breaching one curfew — a term of a probation order that stemmed from a previous matter.

Fleury was then released on another curfew, which he broke on March 16 and then again on the night of the baseball bat attack. In addition, he has admitted to failing to attend court on March 4.

He has been in custody since that time, and will receive credit for time already served, bringing the three-year sentence down to 30 months.