Investigator challenges claim fall led to death

Injuries suggested otherwise, he says

In a small interview room plastered with photos, Sgt. Gabriel Buettner described the injuries Beverly Littlecrow had when she died.

They included a significant black eye and bruising around her mouth, elbow, shoulder and knee. But she died from a subdural hematoma — a severe head injury consistent with a high-speed collision, a great fall or an assault, Buettner explained.

He showed the neurological statements to Gabriel Joseph Faucher during their interview on Feb. 2, 2016 — the day Faucher was charged in connection with Littlecrow’s death. That video was played in court on Thursday at Faucher’s manslaughter trial in Saskatoon Court of Queen’s Bench.

In the video, Buettner said the only logical conclusion was that Faucher caused his girlfriend’s death.

“This woman was a human piñata,” he said.

Faucher vehemently denied the accusation, saying he loved Littlecrow “too much.”

Littlecrow, 36, died in a Saskatoon hospital on Jan. 24, 2016 after she was found unconscious in her Kinley, Sask. home.

Speaking often quickly and in a heavy French accent, Faucher told police Littlecrow fell onto the bed that morning and was “out.” He said he believed she hit her head because there was a mark on the wall, but said he didn’t know what happened because he was asleep. He said she must have died from the fall.

However, Buettner said that type of low-height, low-speed fall would not dent drywall and did not cause her fatal head injury.

Earlier in the trial, a girl — her identity is protection by a publication ban — said she heard Faucher and Littlecrow fighting that night. She also said she saw Faucher punch Littlecrow and push her into a dresser the previous night. That’s how Littlecrow hurt her eye, she testified.

Faucher said they were playfighting and the girl must have been confused. He said Littlecrow had hurt her eye when she fell on a set of outdoor steps three days before she died.

There’s no way that type of fall would have contributed to her death, Buettner said, echoing the neurologist’s findings that “The thing that would have killed her was the last thing to have happened to her.”