An old pickup truck isn’t really worth a human life

A human life taken to save a 15-year-old pickup truck — it just doesn’t seem right.

And that’s why you don’t have to be a legal expert to be deeply concerned about Wednesday’s decision by a jury in Hamilton to acquit Peter Khill in the shooting death of Jonathan Styres.

Nor must you conclude racial bias influenced this trial — Khill is white and Styres was Aboriginal — to understand how the not-guilty verdict has incensed First Nations Canadians. If justice was done, they don’t see it that way.

Whatever the law says and allows, our society is in a precarious state when it is acceptable to use deadly force to prevent a relatively minor property crime. This is what Khill admits to having done.

Awakened at his Binbrook-area home outside Hamilton in the early hours of Feb. 4, 2016, Khill discovered someone apparently trying to steal his GMC pickup.

Khill could have safely remained with his partner, Melinda Benko, within the walls of their home and called 911 for police help. Armed with a shotgun, he could have protected himself and Benko if anyone had tried to get in their home.

But Khill did none of these things and instead went outside with his loaded weapon and shot Styres dead.

In his murder trial, Khill’s explanation was that he acted in self-defence because, in the almost total darkness outside his home, he mistakenly thought the unarmed Styres was pointing a gun at him.

The jury accepted that defence and we do not question their sincerity.

It’s true that individuals are allowed by law to use reasonable force to prevent a crime against themselves, someone else or even property. But we question why, under these circumstances, Khill used force at all. Moreover, the force he employed seemed an unreasonable response to truck theft.

While we can understand the rush of emotions that must have flooded Khill’s mind when he heard someone outside — fear, perhaps anger, and the protective feelings for his partner — he acted on impulse. The consequences of his actions were abhorrent.

It’s arguable that a conviction on a lesser charge of manslaughter would have been appropriate here.

Whatever the jury’s intent, their verdict sends out a troubling message about the extreme lengths to which people can go to to protect private property. It’s an attitude that seems more at home in the United States with its crazy, freewheeling gun laws. And we can only hope some kind of perverse precedent has not been set in Canada.

It is especially unfortunate that Khill’s acquittal comes just months after another incendiary decision, when a jury in Saskatchewan acquitted Gerald Stanley, a white farmer, in the shooting death of Colten Boushie, a young Aboriginal man who was trying to steal a vehicle on Stanley’s farm.

Despite their similarities, the cases have striking differences. While the public was outraged to learn potential Aboriginal jurors were excluded from Stanley’s trial by his lawyer, Khill’s lawyer didn’t employ a similar tactic. Indeed, both the defence and prosecution lawyers in Khill’s trial screened potential jurors for racial bias and the jury included one non-white member. And there’s no proof that Khill even knew Styres was Aboriginal.

Yet, in this era when Canada is struggling to achieve reconciliation with its Indigenous Peoples, Khill’s acquittal has created new, unwanted tensions. Leaders at Styres’ home community — the Six Nations Reserve — want the verdict appealed.

An appeal should not be granted for political purposes. But Ontario’s attorney general should examine this case to see if there are legal grounds for revisiting it.