Bus driver killer’s sentencing on hold while judge ponders joint Crown-defence recommendation

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This article was published 16/06/2019 (1768 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Lawyers for the Crown and defence are recommending a man convicted of fatally stabbing Winnipeg Transit driver Irvine Jubal Fraser be sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 12 years.

Brian Kyle Thomas, 25, was convicted of second-degree murder following a trial last January. The minimum sentence for second-degree murder is life in prison with no chance of parole for 10 years.

Fraser was killed Feb. 14, 2017 during a struggle outside his parked Transit vehicle, near the bus loop on the U of M campus, the last stop on the route. Thomas, who was drunk, had been sleeping in the back of the otherwise empty bus and refused to leave when Fraser asked him repeatedly to do so.

At trial, jurors were shown video footage from the bus in which Thomas appeared confused and told Fraser he didn’t know where he was. Thomas asked to use the phone, said people were following him, and asked to be dropped off at the Victoria General Hospital.

Fraser told Thomas he didn’t care and asked him to get off the bus about 25 times, eventually getting angry, grabbing the smaller man and pushing him out the front doors.

Thomas then taunted him to come outside and fight, and spit in the driver’s face.

Fraser exited the bus and a physical struggle began, with witnesses reporting seeing the smaller man striking the driver. A second Transit bus driver intervened, just as the final stab wounds were being inflicted. Fraser suffered six stab wounds to his neck and upper body.

“The motivation for the stabbing appears to be anger at being ejected from the bus,” Crown attorney Paul Girdlestone said Monday, arguing it was an aggravating factor that Fraser was attacked while performing his duties as a public servant.

Defence lawyer Ted Mariash disputed that characterization of events, arguing Fraser was no longer acting as a bus driver when he put Thomas in a “choke hold” and threw him off the bus.

“In no way, shape or form was Mr. Fraser empowered to… put Mr. Thomas in a choke hold,” Mariash said. “(Fraser) was not acting in the execution of his duties when he got off that bus.”

It wasn’t anger at being thrown off the bus that caused Thomas to attack Fraser, but anger at being choked, Mariash said.

Thomas was shaped by his experience growing up in Shamattawa First Nation, Mariash said, referencing a Gladue report examining Thomas’s Indigenous background.

In Shamattawa, 85 per cent of residents are on social assistance and 84 per cent of those over the age of 15 don’t have a high school education, Mariash said. Substance abuse is rampant. In one eight-day period, 38 residents or four per cent of the population, attempted suicide.

“Why do we let human beings grow up in that kind of community?” Mariash said. “But we do. And Mr. Thomas is a product of his environment.

“This is one of the clearest-cut examples of how the implementation of the Indian Act and its policies has led to the over-representation of Indigenous offenders in our jails,” he said.

Three of Fraser’s brothers provided the court with emotional victim impact statements, giving voice to their pain and loss.

“It’s been 2 1/2 years and it still feels like it happened this morning,” said Dean Byard, as he struggled through tears. “You don’t know what you did, buddy. You really don’t know.”

Manitoba Court of Queen’s Bench Chief Justice Glenn Joyal adjourned sentencing, saying he required further written submissions from the Crown supporting its recommendation for such a short period of parole ineligibility. A final sentencing date is expected to be set for next month.

— With files from Katie May

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca