Woman who killed her own mother spared jail time
Sometimes a most exceptional case calls for the rarest sentence, and on Monday, an Ottawa judge leaned on compassion and hope as he spared a young Inuk woman prison for killing her own mother in a drunken fight on Jan 10, 2019, at the family row house on Penny Drive.
The events leading to the knifing of Susan Kuplu, 37, were so tragic that Ontario Superior Court Justice Robert Maranger accepted a joint recommendation from defence lawyer Diane Condo and leading assistant Crown attorney Meaghan Cunningham that will keep Lennese Kublu, the daughter, out of jail after she pleaded guilty to manslaughter.
The judge — who said they were rooting for the Inuk woman and urged Kublu to take her best shot at turning her life around — spared her jail and sentenced her instead to a two-year conditional sentence.
The sentence will have Kublu, now 21, living in a home under house arrest, then on her own with a curfew followed by probation for a year.
The judge noted that an Indigenous sentencing circle earlier this month — focused on healing and forgiveness — overwhelmingly recommended keeping the young Inuk woman out of jail.
In his ruling, the judge also highlighted Kublu's palpable remorse and guilt at every court hearing since her 2019 arrest alongside her older boyfriend (by 10 years) Dwight Brown, who is now serving seven years in prison for urging the drunken teen to kill her own mother after handing her a knife to execute what the judge branded a “monstrous act.”
The judge said the teen killer's remorse was genuine and noted that she “wept a river of tears” at all the court hearings after her murder confession, which she gave after a gruelling interrogation by Ottawa police detectives.
She was originally charged with second-degree murder but pleaded guilty to the lesser offence of manslaughter, which carries a penalty range from conditional sentence to life in prison.
The judge told court Monday that sending Kublu to prison would be the last thing her dead mother would have wanted.
Kublu, just 18, was living in drunken violence at the time, under the control of her abusive, older crack-dealing boyfriend who she and her mother feared.
She is Indigenous and has been subjected to generational trauma from her relatives, who were rounded up and sent to residential schools.
She had a rough childhood, steeped in booze and violence.
She suffered from addiction after moving to the south when a relative needed medical treatment at an Ottawa hospital.
The judge also noted that Kublu wanted to call the police right away but her boyfriend at the time said he'd kill her if she did.
Cunningham, the assistant Crown attorney, showed deep compassion and embraced the spirit of the sentencing circle's recommendation, and appreciated that the Kublu family's great pain and loss would be compounded if she “was taken away to prison.”
Kublu has been ordered by the court to continue counselling for addiction and her mother's death.
Kublu's defence lawyer filed several letters of support in court on Monday, including notes from counsellors who report that the young Inuk woman has made great strides.
Defence lawyer Condo told this newspaper that Monday's ruling “marked the end of a very tragic and difficult legal process for my client and her family.”
“They have begun healing in their traditional ways but it is a burden she is carrying every day and she will for the rest of her life.
“She wants eventually to be able to give back to the community by helping young girls.”