‘Cut throat’ defence tactics at Reno Lee murder trial

Questions asked by defence lawyers for three men charged with killing Reno Lee suggest “cut throat” defence tactics are coming into play at the trial.

This week saw testimony from two men who provided versions of what happened on the night of April 16, 2015, and early morning of April 17, 2015 — the dates it’s alleged 34-year-old Lee was taken to the basement of a Regina house and shot twice in the head, then dismembered.

Three men are standing trial at Regina Court of Queen’s Bench, each accused of first-degree murder. Andrew Bellegarde, 24, Bronson Gordon, 33, and Daniel Theodore, 34, are also charged with offering an indignity to human remains by dismembering and decapitating Lee’s body.

Among witnesses called by the Crown this week were two men who said they were present when Lee was being held prior to his death. Neither of the men can be named due to court-imposed publication bans.

Under questioning by Crown prosecutors Adam Breker and Bill Jennings, the first witness told the court he owed a drug debt to Gordon when he was recruited to help confine Lee, who also owed a debt. The witness testified Gordon gave him a gun and that he and Bellegarde ambushed Lee at Gordon’s apartment, holding him there until Gordon directed them to leave with Theodore and a woman.

The witness said they headed to a house on the 1100 block of Garnet Street where he bound Lee with tape at Theodore’s behest.

The second witness said he was living at the Garnet Street house when Gordon called to tell him people were coming over.

The man testified several people came in and headed into his basement where, later, he saw Lee tied up. Both men said they left the house before Lee was killed. The second man said he arrived home several days later to what he believed was blood in his basement.

Defence lawyers for the three accused — Mike Buchinski for Bellegarde, Marianna Jasper for Gordon and George Combe for Theodore — cross-examined both men in detail, with some of their questions suggestive of what is often termed a “cut throat” defence strategy in which one attempts to pin blame on another.

In Combe’s questioning of the second witness, the man initially said he wasn’t certain it was Gordon who called him that night, he admitted under cross-examination it was. Combe went on to question the man about Bellegarde.

“Would it be fair to say he was acting a little crazy with that firearm?” Combe asked, to which the witness replied, “Yes.” The witness said Bellegarde, while in the basement, was high on drugs and waving his arms — and therefore the gun — around.

Meanwhile, Buchinski questioned the first witness on who he believed was in charge at the Garnet Street residence, to which the witness indicated “Buddha” — Theodore’s reported street name.

Defence counsel also looked for weaknesses in the witnesses’ recollection of events.