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City to alter B&B bylaw
Making connections
Opposition to the Seabreeze may have backfired. The city’s planing committee recommends switching from a zoning to a licensing scheme for B&Bs, which will leave neighbours with little input.
Youth Connections program helps two mentally challenged teenagers feel included and makes them feel extraordinarily ordinary.
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RCMP
Coach red-carded Soccer dad happens to have same birthday as sex offender BY A LAN C AMPBELL acampbell@richmond-news.com
A soccer coach who has been volunteering his free time to coach his kids’ teams in Richmond for eight years is now not even allowed to enter the field. The coach, who doesn’t want to be named, refuses to have his fingerprints taken by the RCMP as part of new criminal record check rules. BC Soccer changed its policy in June, ordering all its member associations, such as the Richmond Youth Soccer Association (RYSA), to have its employees and coaches go through criminal record checks, as already happens in minor hockey and baseball. But the RCMP, in August, also changed its rules, with red flags now popping up if the birth date of someone being checked matches that of a known sex offender. The coach, who should be coaching his son’s U14 team this fall season, said he
was shocked when the RCMP asked for his prints. “I’ve never been in an RCMP office in my life and when I got asked to give a fingerprint in front of my son, I was humiliated,” he said. “Perhaps if the procedure was explained to me beforehand, I might have reacted differently. “The only thing I’ve ever been guilty of is speeding, so I’ve no problem doing a criminal record check.” Asked how he now feels at not being allowed on the field to coach the team, he said, “It hurts. It seems like I’ve been fired from my second job.” The RCMP changed the criminal record check procedure after it realized that an individual could potentially avoid being linked to their pardoned sex offence if he/she used a different name during the checks. To close the loophole, police now see RYSA page 4
CRIME
Joshua Berner trial ends CHUNG CHOW/RICHMOND NEWS
Self defence claimed in the death of Ben Warland
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BY NELSON BENNETT nbennett@richmond-news.com
Benjamin Warland may have had a reputation for violence, and may have started the fight that ended his life Jan. 31, 2009. But that didn’t give his killer, Joshua Berner, the right to deliver the fatal knife jab to the head that killed him, said Crown prosecutor Brian MacFarlane.
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“You can’t kill someone just because you’ve been assaulted,” MacFarlane told a five-man, seven-woman jury Thursday. Berner’s lawyer, David Tarnow, argued his client did what anyone would do when facing a violent young man armed with a knife. “He did what any reasonable man would do — he stopped the attack,” Tarnow said.
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Defence and Crown wrapped up their arguments Thursday. The jury must now decide whether to acquit Berner, 26, or find him guilty of second degree murder, or the lesser charge of manslaughter. Warland, 23, was found dead in the early hours of Feb. 1, 2009 in the yard of a home near Cambie and Dallyn roads. He had several see Crown page 4 07283111
Food imitates art ... River Rock Casino Resort’s chef de banquet, Jamal Asmi, above left, and Jamie Alvaren prepare lamb polpette for the British Columbian Restaurant and Food Services Association’s (BCRFA) Hall of Fame Induction. Right, artist Joy Caros with her portrait of top Vancouver chef Rob Feenie.