NCR defence rejected over lack of evidence, denial

A not-criminally-responsible defence for a Brandon man with a neurocognitive disorder was thrown out by a Manitoba judge this week due to a lack of evidence and because the accused “flatly denied” murdering his mother with a hatchet in the fall of 2023.

Gabriel Paul Heymans, 47, was found guilty of second-degree murder in the death of his 71-year-old mother, Maureen Heymans, in a Brandon courtroom on Monday.

Defence lawyers for Heymans argued during his April trial that he should be held not criminally responsible (NCR) after he suffered a traumatic brain injury in a 1998 workplace incident.

A psychiatrist found Heymans was fit to stand trial despite past medical assessments showing the accused experienced significant problems with his short-term memory, a diagnosis of bipolar disorder and that he had reported hearing voices in 2001.

Heymans’ defence lawyers did not call several witnesses who might have helped prove their case, including a doctor who found the accused was unfit to stand trial in 2016 on other charges, or any evidence the accused heard voices prior to the killing, said Manitoba Court of King’s Bench Justice Elliot Leven in a written decision.

“Standing alone, these two minor points are far from sufficient to prove that the accused is NCR for the events of late October and early November 2023,” Leven said.

“For these reasons, the NCR defence must fail.”

Leven’s 51-page decision wasn’t made available to the Sun until Tuesday afternoon.

For an NCR case to be successful, the defence must prove the accused was incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of the act or knew it was morally wrong, Leven said.

“The accused never confessed to striking the victim with the hatchet … and there was no evidence that the accused had any motive to kill the victim,” the decision said.

“Because the victim knew him so well, he could have approached her at any time without alarming her. She would not likely have started screaming when she first saw him.”

Maureen’s decaying body was discovered by a maintenance worker on Nov. 3 following a complaint about a foul odour in the apartment building at 264 McDiarmid Dr.

Brandon police officers arrived on scene and saw the deceased woman on the living room floor with a pool of blood surrounding her head and a bloodied hatchet nearby.

Officers saw the accused dart down the hallway into a bedroom before he was handcuffed and interviewed by police, who described his “mundane” behaviour as untypical for someone who had been arrested for murder.

In his statement to police, Heymans said the last time he saw his mother awake was after he returned home from the grocery store on Oct. 25. He took a nap, ate Pizza Pops and then watched two movies before going back to sleep.

He briefly awoke to make more Pizza Pops around 5 a.m. and then saw his mother lying on the floor with his hatchet nearby when he got out of bed around 9:30 a.m., he told police.

Heymans said he believed his mother was sleeping and didn’t call 911. He continued to follow his daily routines, including watching movies and going to a grocery store.

“He said he didn’t realize she was dead until he was arrested on Nov. 3,” Leven said.

Video surveillance last showed his mother alive on Oct. 24 when she was checking the mail at the apartment.

Heymans told police he thought an unknown intruder had entered the apartment, taken his hatchet and killed his mother without waking him, despite being a light sleeper.

“The accused did not suggest who this intruder might be or why the intruder might have wanted to kill the victim,” Leven said, adding that he thought the accused’s version of events was “far-fetched.”

If this theory was correct, it doesn’t explain Heymans’ post-offence behaviour, Leven said.

“Even if he believed that she was sleeping on the floor for a week … he would at least have thought that she needed some sort of medical help,” Leven said.

Police also found more than $1,300 cash in the apartment and noted there were no signs of forced entry.

If an intruder had entered the apartment and killed the woman, “one would have expected the unknown robber to have taken the cash before leaving,” Leven said.

“There is no evidence of any other violent incidents happening in the building at roughly the same time as the death of the victim.”

Defence counsel did not cross-examine the maintenance worker on this topic, Leven said.

The defence argued Heymans’ behaviour after his mother’s death was not consistent with an effort to hide the crime or reduce any suspicion that might fall upon him, the decision said.

His counsel also said if Heymans intended to fabricate evidence in his statement, he would have done a “better job” by claiming that he was a heavy sleeper, for example.

Leven noted the defence didn’t argue Heymans was unfit to stand trial, under the influence of drugs or alcohol or that he was guilty of manslaughter instead of second-degree murder.

He said the psychiatrist, who interviewed Heymans twice after the murder and testified in the trial, was a credible Crown witness and determined an NCR defence was rendered moot because the accused didn’t admit to the killing.

The accused told the psychiatrist that he had never experienced any delusional beliefs and auditory or visual hallucinations. The psychiatrist said it was possible the accused didn’t remember killing his mother because of a memory impairment or that he was lying when he denied killing her.

Heymans, who listened to the hearing by phone from the Brandon Regional Health Centre on Monday, will be sentenced at a later date.

» tadamski@brandonsun.com