Registered sex offender hearing date set for Bird

A man sentenced to 15 years in a federal penitentiary for a vicious sexual assault on the city’s southside nearly two years ago was back in a Lethbridge courtroom Tuesday.

Denzel Dre Colton Bird, who appeared in court by closed-circuit TV from the Calgary Remand Centre, was brought into court to set a date for the sentencing judge to hear an application to have Bird registered under SOIRA, the Sex Offender Information Registration Act.

The order was not granted when Bird was sentenced in June because the legislation had, following an unrelated case, been declared of no force and effect, which no longer gave courts the authority to impose SOIRA. But Tuesday Crown prosecutor Erin Olsen pointed out the declaration has been temporarily stayed, restoring authority to judges.

The matter is still before the court, however, until a final judgment on the legislation is decided.

Bird is scheduled to return to court Oct. 15 when the SOIRA application will go before Judge Jerry LeGrandeur.

Bird pleaded guilty last year and admitted that on Sept. 30, 2016 he attacked a woman with a metal pipe and sexually assaulted her before dragging her into an alley and dumping her body into a residential garbage can.

LeGrandeur called Bird’s attack a “horrifying act,” which left the woman and her family forever scarred.

“In this case, the level of violence was extreme,” LeGrandeur said during sentencing June 15.

The woman also sustained severe traumatic brain injuries and was in a medically induced coma for several weeks. Nearly a month after the attack she was moved from intensive care to a unit that could manage her traumatic brain injury, and over the next month she began improving neurologically. She was finally discharged from hospital in Calgary Jan. 31, 2017.

Bird was arrested at a westside apartment building five days after the attack, and he told police he did not recall anything about the morning in question and that he had never seen the victim before. He claimed he never hurt her and he was drinking near some schools on the westside at the time of the attack. He eventually admitted his guilt, provided a re-enactment and described to police details of the attack.

Defence lawyer Tonii Roulston had recommended a sentence of six to eight years — the Crown had suggested 20 years — and following the sentencing hearing law student Jeanine Zahara told reporters Bird was visibly upset by the judge’s decision and had indicated he would appeal the sentence.

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