Youth sentenced for attack on BU student

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This article was published 29/05/2025 (302 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A 15-year-old Sioux Valley boy was sentenced to two years of probation on Wednesday after spending five months in custody for attacking and robbing a woman near the Brandon University campus.

The woman — a student at the university — suffered serious injuries in the attack.

“The fact that he’s spent five months in custody can’t be ignored and it’s certainly a consequence to him, a real loss of liberty for a period of time,” Manitoba Associate Chief Judge Donovan Dvorak said in Brandon provincial court.

Crown attorney Rich Lonstrup said a seven-month sentence — 140 days in closed custody and 70 in the community — followed by two years of probation would be appropriate.

Defence lawyer Jennifer Janssens asked that the sentence itself be two years of supervised probation so that the youth can go straight into residential treatment to work through his substance abuse.

On Nov. 23, 2024, a student was on her way to visit friends who live in residence on the BU campus when the youth and an adult co-accused attacked and robbed the woman.

The youth pleaded guilty during a previous court appearance on April 8, and Dvorak said he admitted to kicking the victim in the head three to five times.

Lonstrup said the victim has gone through immense physical and emotional pain as a result.

“She was left with physical scarring,” he said. “But internally, maybe even worse, she was traumatized. There was scarring on the inside.”

Lonstrup said the woman now has multiple triggers, including nighttime, darkness, riding the bus and walking alone on campus. He said her friends have told her they don’t feel safe. Staff and students have openly called for better security.

As a direct result of these calls to action as well as community outrage following the attack, Lonstrup said the university is going to conduct a safety audit of the premises.

Janssens said the primary goal of the sentence should be rehabilitation and reintegration into the community, which can be achieved through supervised probation.

She said the boy immediately took responsibly when police confronted him and gave a full confession. He pleaded guilty at the earliest opportunity, which Janssens said shows his remorse.

Janssens said the boy has been in the care of Child and Family Services since he was two years old, either with other family members or in foster homes.

She said he started abusing alcohol at 13 years old and has since started to experiment with methamphetamine.

“(He) has been a survivor of terrible neglect by family members, and he witnessed substance abuse by the adults in his life. He’s had very little stability, with multiple placements and early exposure to drugs in his childhood,” Janssens said.

She said the court must consider his moral blameworthiness, pointing out that he is young and was influenced by the adult co-accused who he said initiated the attack.

She said the youth claims the co-accused suddenly began the assault and he made the poor choice to get involved.

Dvorak said that if the boy had not been in custody for five months already, he would most likely be looking at a custodial sentence. The youth justice system doesn’t allow time-served sentences, but he said the time in custody was noted.

“He was 14 years old at the time with no prior violent record,” the judge said. “We go through a progression as humans from infants to adults, and brain development carries on right into and through adulthood and certainly at 14 years old it’s still developing.”

One of the probation orders is that the youth must not be within 50 metres of the victim or her residence, place of work, worship or education. He also must not go within 50 metres of the BU campus unless incidentally travelling past.

» sanderson@brandonsun.com