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Thursday, March 7, 2019 | Your community newspaper since 1916

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Flooded street A water main break flooded Third Avenue on Wednesday, sending water pouring into downtown. City crews were on the scene Wednesday night with heavy equipment excavating the broken pipe.

New trial ordered Deadline looms for bus service in shooting death Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff

Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff mnielsen@pgcitizen.ca The B.C. Court of Appeal has ordered a new trial for a Vanderhoof man who was sentenced to four years in prison for the shooting death of his fiancee. In a decision issued Wednesday, the court found B.C. Supreme Court Justice Paul Pearlman’s charge to the jury was “inconsistent and confusing” with regard to the elements of the two charges Kayne Sabbe Penner was facing. As well as finding him guilty of careless use of the firearm, the jury also found him guilty of the more serious count of manslaughter – and it was on that charge that Penner was sentenced. Penner, who was sentenced in September 2017, had been out on bail for much of the time since then, pending the outcome of the appeal. He will remain out on bail while waiting for a new trial. He had been issued the term for the Dec. 20, 2012 shooting death of April Johnson, 18. Penner was handling a .22-calibre semiautomatic rifle within the confines of his cousin’s trailer home in the community west of Prince George when it went off. The bullet struck Johnson in the stomach and she later died in hospital. Shortly after beginning to deliberate, the jury returned with two questions, the second being whether Penner could be found guilty of one charge without the other. The Court of Appeal found the jury could have found Penner guilty of man-

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slaughter solely on the essential elements for proving careless use and without considering whether there was a foreseeable risk of bodily harm which is “neither trivial nor transitory.” Pearlman had conflated elements of the two offences when he gave his charge and then failed to take steps to determine the source of the jury members’ uncertainty. “Had the judge done so, he would have been able to dispel that uncertainty and, perhaps, correct his charge,” the Court of Appeal said in the decision, written by Justice David Frankel and concurred by Justice Sunni Stromberg-Stein and Justice John Savage. And that both Crown and defence counsels failed to raise that point when discussing with Pearlman how to best address the jury’s question was attributed to oversight rather than tactical reasons. During the trial, the court heard that the rifle had been leaning against the home’s kitchen counter with the safety off when Penner picked it up. Although told it was unloaded, Penner later told police he was “checking it” and, in a video of the interview, he was seen motioning as if he was pulling back the rifle’s slide to check the chamber. Penner said he did not see a bullet in the chamber but, as he was holding it horizontally, it went off. Johnson, who was getting ready to go target shooting, was standing by the home’s door a short distance away. The full decision is posted with this story at www.pgcitizen.ca.

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The chances are dimming for realization of a privately-run bus service connecting Prince George to the Lower Mainland. Gene Field of Merritt Shuttle Bus Service Ltd. said the Passenger Transportation Board has given him until Friday to get at least two buses licenced and insured or relinquish a permit to provide the service. “I don’t think it’s going to happen,” Field said Wednesday. MSBS was among a half-dozen applicants that won PTB permission in November to run long-haul services across B.C. It was granted through an expedited process in advance of Greyhound Canada pulling out of Western Canada. The plan was to run eight 22-passenger shuttle-sized buses along four routes centred on Merritt but also serving Prince

George, Langley, Kamloops and Kelowna. Frequency of service along those routes would been at least three round trips a week. MSBS had also won permission to run four 48-passenger buses twice a day between the Highland Valley Copper Mine and Merritt and Kamloops. But since then, Field has had trouble securing investors and a bid to getting funding from various public bodies has fallen through. Added to his woes, his partner in the venture suddenly died last week. Field said he had asked for an extension to the start of May to give him time to restructure the business following his partner’s death but was turned down. “A miracle could happen between now and Friday but that’s two days, so I don’t know,” Field said.

IIO investigating after man’s arm broken while fleeing police Citizen staff B.C.’s civilian-based police watchdog is investigating an incident in Prince George. The Independent Investigations Office said Thursday it has been notified that a male arrested on Feb. 28 after trying to flee police suffered a broken arm and the agency is working to determine if there is a connection between the injury and the arresting officer’s actions. Shortly before noon on that day, the officer was attempting to perform a traffic stop on Fifth Avenue near Ruggles Street.

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“According to the RCMP, the male’s vehicle was involved in a collision with the marked police vehicle and the male driver attempted to flee on foot,” the IIO said. “The officer was able to apprehend the male and arrest him. “Shortly after the arrest, the male complained of pain and following a hospital visit, it was reported that the male had a fractured arm.” The IIO investigates all officer-related incidents that result in serious harm or death, whether or not there is any allegation of wrongdoing.

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