Crown wants adult sentence for youth
The Crown is seeking an adult sentence for a youth who fatally shot a man following a confrontation between two groups of young men in Burnaby.
The teen, who was 16 at the time he killed Aladdin Ramadan, 20, in September 2014 and cannot be identified due to a publication ban, was acquitted by a jury of second-degree murder but convicted of the lesser offence of manslaughter.
In sentencing submissions Wednesday in Vancouver, Crown counsel Linda Ostry said that the central issue on sentencing was the nature of the confrontation that resulted in Ramadan being shot to death.
She told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Heather Holmes that the circumstances including the events leading up to the shooting and the fact that the victim was shot three times meant that it was a case of “near murder” and called for an adult sentence.
Ostry noted that before the shooting, the teen was picked up in Surrey by an acquaintance named Samir Mokhtar, who had a beef with the victim. The teen had a loaded firearm in his possession.
Mokhtar, who was charged with the manslaughter of Ramadan but was himself the victim of a fatal shooting in July 2015, drove to Burnaby with the teen and another young man. They were travelling along the Lougheed Highway when another car driven by Ramadan pulled up beside their vehicle. The two vehicles turned right onto Rosser Avenue and then pulled over to the curb, the groups of young men in each vehicle spilling out into the street.
When Ramadan walked quickly toward Mokhtar, the teen got into the middle of the two men and following a struggle with Ramadan, fired three shots at the victim.
One shot entered the victim’s back, blowing out part of his heart, while another shot went through his brain stem. Both were potentially fatal shots. A third shot went through his right side.
Joseph Saulnier, a lawyer for the teen, conceded that possessing a firearm was an aggravating factor for his client but argued that the teen had no plan and fired the shots because he was fearful of Ramadan, a large and muscular man. Saulnier, who is seeking a youth sentence for the teen, said there was also no evidence of a Crown theory that the teen was acting as a bodyguard for Mokhtar at the time of the slaying.
Sarah Ramadan, a younger sister of the victim, gave a tearful statement in court.
There is a mandatory minimum of four years in prison for a youth who receives an adult sentence for manslaughter in a case where a firearm is used in the commission of the offence and a maximum of life in prison. A youth sentence for manslaughter carries a maximum sentence of three years.
The accused was arrested about a week after the shooting. He was carrying a loaded 9 mm semi-automatic pistol in his waistband. The Crown said the gun was the weapon used in the slaying.
The sentencing hearing is scheduled to be finished by Friday.