Lawyer seeks new trial in 2019 murder case

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This article was published 12/01/2024 (649 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

WINNIPEG — A Toronto-based lawyer famed for representing the wrongfully convicted has asked the Manitoba Court of Appeal to overturn the 2022 conviction of a Winnipeg man found guilty of slaying his mother.

On Wednesday, James Lockyer, a founding director of Innocence Canada, appeared before Justices Holly Beard, Karen Simonsen and David Kroft seeking to have them order a new trial and allow fresh evidence to be admitted.

The now-21-year-old was 16 when his mother was beaten to death with a blunt object in her bed in her Southdale home in March 2019. He was convicted of second-degree murder by a Court of King’s Bench jury in June 2022.

Lockyer argued Wednesday there is evidence to suggest it was a former co-worker of the 51-year-old victim — whom the Free Press is not naming, as it would identify the then-teen contrary to law — who committed the slaying or had someone kill the victim on his behalf.

Crown prosecutors argued at trial, and in response to the appeal, the son was the only person who had the opportunity to kill the victim, pointing to motion sensor cameras on neighbouring homes that appeared to show he was the only person to leave or enter the house that morning.

Prosecutors had argued the man left the home that day to run errands as a ruse, after waking early to kill his mother.

In January 2023, the King’s Bench justice who presided over the jury trial sentenced him to the maximum youth sentence of seven years custody, with three to be served under conditional supervision in the community.

The man and much of the victim’s family have long proclaimed his innocence. He has been on bail since the appeal was filed in February 2023.

“The strength of an appeal is always going to be tempered by the strength or weakness of the case for the Crown and the strength or the weakness of the defence,” Lockyer told court in his opening address Wednesday.

He argued the Crown’s arguments at trial were predicated on the presumption the man killed his mother and did not respect the presumption of innocence.

“The case to a great degree, in my submission, is one of opportunity. Did (the appellant) have exclusive opportunity to murder his mother or did (a co-worker of the victim) or someone on his behalf have the opportunity to murder (the victim)?” Lockyer said.

“If there wasn’t exclusive opportunity, then in my submission, the court can fairly take into consideration that there was every reason to believe that (the appellant) was the last person on Earth who would kill his mother. They had a relationship that was one to be envied — a mother-son relationship full of love, tenderness, mutual respect and endearment.”

Police detectives had interviewed the former co-worker, after the son told investigators the man had been harassing his mother at work.

They found the co-worker’s whereabouts around the time of the killing were confirmed by electronic records showing his arrival and departure from work and a sign-in sheet showing he had dropped his children off at the YMCA.

However, Lockyer said it appears police never seriously considered the co-worker as a suspect.

The victim filed a sexual harassment complaint about the former co-worker and texted her sister in May 2018: “If something ever happens to me, it’s him,” Lockyer told court.

The woman also feared the co-worker had been following her and discussed getting security cameras for her home with her boyfriend shortly before her slaying, Lockyer said.

The lawyer told the judges the co-worker could have used a borrowed card to exit his workplace and had ample time to kill the woman while the son was out of the house on errands.

“The key, of course … is motive. He had a motive (the appellant) did not. He had a hatred for (the appellant’s) mother and had cause to commit the violence and was capable of committing the violence that in my submission (the appellant) did not,” Lockyer told court.

“Above all, in my submission, what a coincidence, that (the appellant) kills his mother for reasons that are impossible to comprehend when there was another person whom she had predicted would be responsible if anything ever happened to her.”

Lockyer also presented a fresh evidence motion — arguing the evidence should be heard on appeal — which focused on lights detected on a neighbouring houses’ video camera hours before the son left the home to run errands.

He argued the lights did not come from the victim’s house, but from a neighbour’s home. Lockyer said the Crown suggested the lights came from the victim’s house as evidence the son woke early, let the dog out, then locked the dog in the basement before committing the killing.

He argued if the lights came from a neighbour’s home, it supports the theory the killing occurred while the son was out of the house later in the morning.

The appeal court judges reserved their decision until a later date.

Lockyer previously represented Brian Anderson and Allan (A.J.) Woodhouse when they were acquitted in July 2023 of the 1973 slaying of Winnipeg restaurant worker Ting Fong Chan.

He has also been involved in overturning the murder convictions of David Milgaard, Kyle Unger, James Driskell, Frank Ostrowski and others across the country.

» Winnipeg Free Press