Teneycke returning for hearing in May
Crown seeking to have notorious criminal locked up indefinitely as dangerous offender
One of the South Okanagan’s most notorious criminals returns to Penticton in two months for a dangerous offender hearing.
The Crown is seeking to have Ronald Teneycke locked up indefinitely due to his long criminal record, the most recent entries on which came in July 2015, when he robbed an Oliver convenience store at gunpoint and shot a man on a forestry road outside the community.
Lawyers who will work on the hearing convened Wednesday in provincial court in Penticton for a pre-trial conference and confirmed they’re ready to begin as scheduled on May 8.
Court heard, however, that defence counsel Michael Welsh will be unavailable May 11 due to a commitment as president of the B.C. branch of the Canadian Bar Association.
Crown counsel Murray Kaay said Welsh had been “very reasonable in terms of accommodating how we’re putting this case forward,” and suggested the court sit longer in the three days leading up to May 11 to make up the time.
That idea was quickly shot down by Judge Richard Hewson, who appeared via videoconference from the Vernon courthouse.
“I know from my own experience at the other courthouses that sitting past 4:30 p.m., particularly when it’s done routinely, causes a great deal of problems for the registry staff — they can have pickup times for children in daycare, it creates a number of different problems,” he said.
Hewson instead suggested that morning and afternoon breaks during the proceedings be kept to no more than 15 minutes in order to keep things moving.
Following the first three days, the hearing will resume May 23-26. The first week of August has also been set aside if necessary.
Teneycke is currently behind bars, but did not appear Wednesday due to technical difficulties with videoconferencing equipment.
The dangerous offender hearing was triggered in April 2016 when he pleaded guilty to four offences — robbery, discharging a firearm with intent to wound, using a firearm to commit a robbery and flight from a peace officer — related to the series of incidents in July 2015.
If declared a dangerous offender, Teneycke could be locked up indefinitely. He could also be designated a long-term offender, which doesn’t carry an indefinite jail term but allows the court to impose strict conditions on his release.
If he’s found to be neither a dangerous nor long-term offender, he’ll receive a standard jail sentence.
Teneycke’s criminal record dates back to 1981, but he gained notoriety in 2007 when police in the South Okanagan warned the public about his release from prison after completing a 12-year sentence for sexually assaulting a teenager and threatening to kill a correctional officer. He has been in and out of jail ever since.