A now 20-year-old man who was 17 when he carried out a mass shooting in La Loche will serve an adult sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for 10 years.
Judge Janet McIvor imposed a sentence for each of the 11 victims of the shooting: two life sentences with no parole eligibility for 10 years for the first-degree murders of Adam Wood and Marie Janvier, two life sentences with no parole eligibility for seven years for the second-degree murders of Dayne and Drayden Fontaine and seven 15-year sentences for the seven injured in the shooting.
The shooter will serve all sentences concurrently, or at the same time, because a judge can’t impose consecutive sentences on a youth, even if the offender is sentenced as an adult. The shooter was under 18 at the time of the crimes and will spend life in a federal institution and won’t be eligible for parole for at least 10 years.
The sentences come nearly one year after the shooter’s sentencing hearing began in Meadow Lake Provincial Court. La Loche Mayor Robert St. Pierre said it’s bittersweet the court process is over, but he’s happy with the judge’s decision.
“The community itself, we’re struggling. There’s a lot of pain. There’s a lot of hurt,” he said Tuesday.
McIvor told court the school shooting on Jan. 22, 2016, was planned and calculated by the offender. He had previously searched online about guns, ammunition and what it feels like to kill someone.
“When he woke up, he knew that was the day he was going to shoot up the school,” the judge said.
He first shot and killed Dayne, 17, and Drayden, 13, in a home. The shooter posted to Facebook after killing the brothers, as he drove a truck to the school. He wrote: “just killed 2 ppl” and “bout to shoot ip (sic) the school.”
He entered the school at 1:04 p.m., according to an agreed statement of facts. Wood, 35, was fatally shot from close range and Janvier, 21, was also killed. Seven other people were injured.
The then-teen was arrested by RCMP minutes later, at 1:16 p.m., after exiting a school washroom unarmed and announcing he was the shooter.
The shooter pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of second-degree murder and seven counts of attempted murder in October 2016.
He briefly spoke in court Tuesday and apologized to his family and the mother of the Fontaine brothers.
“They were both doing good in school and wanted to do other things in life but can’t because of the choices I made,” he told court.
“I also want to apologize to every one of my victims and everyone else in La Loche. …I can’t undo what I did.”
Community of La Loche ‘abandoned’ after shooting
McIvor was outspoken during the sentencing about the lack of services and mental health help in the community following the shooting. She said La Loche has been “abandoned” by a government that promised to help.
“This is another victimization of all involved,” she said. “It’s not fair. It’s not right.”
The judge said she’s heard of victims not having access to services they need such physiotherapy or counselling for post-traumatic stress.
The mayor of La Loche said the community still needs help more than two years after the shooting, and that provincial and federal government promises of support have not been kept.
“We don’t want a hand out, we want a hand up. We stipulated all this previously,” St. Pierre said.
Premier Scott Moe said he hasn’t yet read McIvor’s decision, but plans to. He pointed to provincial programs initiated in the community including a trade program for the high school, but said there is more work to do.
“When we’re faced with any type of tragic occurrence here in the province of Saskatchewan, we need to work hard to do better in areas such as La Loche,” he told reporters.
Moe mentioned the province’s Dene teacher education program, in which young people are trained to be teachers in their native language.
“That, I would put forward, is a strong investment for that community into the future as they were having challenges in recruiting educators.”
The question of ‘why?’
Defence lawyer Aaron Fox asked McIvor recommend the shooter serve his sentence at the Regional Psychiatric Centre in Saskatoon. McIvor denied the request and said she will leave the decision up to the institution.
Fox said the man needs long-term mental health help and that a motive for the shooting is still unclear and something we may never understand. He said he asked his client why he carried out the shooting, to which he responded, “I ask myself that everyday.”
Fox said the teen being sentenced to a psychiatric facility may help him understand why he carried out the crimes and said that should be an important question to so many including the victims, school system, police and other social agencies.
“Because if we know why, then maybe there’s something that could have been done to prevent this from ever happening in the first place,” Fox told reporters outside court. “The benefit of that goes far beyond just the offender here. All of us would benefit if we could find an answer to that.”
Fox also expressed frustration over the lack of services for La Loche, as well as the shooter. He said RPC would be the best place for him to get help with his mental health, cognitive and behavioral issues.
“There is a frustration that we’re now in May of 2018 and that process (of getting help) hasn’t even started…it might not start for another couple years,” he said. “The lack of services in this province is just astounding.”
Publication ban
The shooter’s identity is protected by a publication ban because he was just shy of his 18th birthday at the time of the crimes. The ban can be lifted because he was sentenced as an adult, but McIvor ruled the ban remain in effect during the 30-day appeal period. Fox said the defence team is not ruling out appealing the adult sentence at this stage.
Angelina Irinici was in Meadow Lake for the sentencing. Follow her live coverage below:
