Man charged in 2016 death gets 15 years for manslaughter
Gang member shot, left to die in field after home invasion in Saskatoon
Although Raymond Joseph Roberts and Gilbert Mccallum were part of a group that travelled to Saskatoon for a home invasion, that same group later turned on Mccallum, shooting him in a field, taking his belongings and leaving him to die.
Roberts, Mccallum, Korena Jolynn Bonneau, Johnathon Richard Tremblay and John Clint Tinker were members of a northern Saskatchewan gang that drove to Saskatoon to rob someone of drugs and money on April 16, 2016, according to the agreed facts presented on Friday during Roberts’ manslaughter sentencing in Saskatoon Court of Queen’s Bench.
After the robbery, Tremblay told another woman that Mccallum “screwed up.” As they drove back to Prince Albert, the group pulled onto a side road and into a field near Rosthern that they later dubbed “the love spot.”
Roberts declared “victory rounds” and the group grabbed their guns to fire shots.
“Roberts had a .22-calibre hand gun which was later used to shoot Mccallum in the back of the head, an offence to which he admits being a party,” the facts state. The gun was later found at Roberts’ home.
Instead of standing trial for first-degree murder, Roberts, 31, pleaded guilty on Friday to manslaughter with a firearm. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison after Justice Mona Dovell accepted a joint submission from Crown prosecutor Bryce Pashovitz and defence lawyer Kathy Hodgson-smith.
The group took Mccallum’s phone, identification and watch and left him in the field, where his body, blackened by decay, was found two months later. A forensic pathologist determined he had been shot twice in the head.
Mccallum’s family members had been searching for their missing loved one.
“Taking my brother from me has been unimaginably hard. My brother was a great person; he was my best friend,” one of his sisters said during Roberts’ sentencing hearing.
Roberts, Bonneau, Tremblay and Tinker were charged in connection with Mccallum’s death two years later, in March 2018.
Bonneau, 37, was sentenced on May 5 to seven years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter. The facts state she was the driver, and at one point told someone that she pulled the trigger.
Tremblay, 24, and Tinker, 21, were each sentenced to 11 years after pleading guilty to manslaughter last year. In a letter from jail,
Tinker wrote about “doing something bad” and that if he was caught “I don’t think I’ll see the other side of the fence for well probably my whole life,” according to the facts.
Roberts received 13 years for manslaughter. He was given another year for intimidating a justice system participant by telling a Crown witness “You’re f---ing dead” after the man testified at his preliminary hearing in 2019, and a further year for stabbing a fellow inmate with a shank at the Regina provincial jail in 2018.
Court heard Roberts’ prior criminal record — including approximately 10 previous assault and firearm-related convictions dating back to 2007 — contributed to him receiving a higher sentence than his co-accused.
With a four-year credit for his time spent on remand, Roberts has 11 years of his sentence remaining. Hodgson-smith said her client spent much of his pre-sentence custody in segregation and has had a difficult time in jail.
She said the 15-year sentence reflects the fact that Roberts did not intend to kill Mccallum, while considering his Gladue factors of intergenerational and personal trauma and meeting the principles of denunciation and deterrence.
Ultimately, no one took direct responsibility for being the shooter through their manslaughter pleas. Dovell told Mccallum’s family members that she still hopes their healing process can begin now that the sentencing process is over.