Crown wants escorted outings revoked as option for child killer
Giving a B.C. man who killed his three children during a psychotic break the false hope of escorted outings from a psychiatric facility will interfere with his recovery from serious mental illness, a review board has heard.
Crown counsel Wendy Dawson advised a B.C. Review Board hearing Friday to withdraw the discretionary power it gave the Forensic Psychiatric Hospital in Coquitlam two years ago to allow Allan Schoenborn, 49, accompanied trips into the community.
“Holding out the possibility of (outings), dangling the carrot by the treatment team, did not get Mr. Schoenborn engaged in treatment,” she told the board. “Expediency never trumps public safety."
But defence lawyer Dante Abbey said the possibility of escorted outings is an important tool to motivate Schoenborn in his recovery and withdrawing it would do further harm.
He said Schoenborn is improving. “He is making a genuine effort. He is digging down and looking for answers.”
Schoenborn stabbed his 10-yearold daughter Kaitlynne and smothered his sons Max and Cordon, who were eight and five, in their home in Merritt in April 2008.
A judge later ruled the man was not criminally responsible for the deaths because he was experiencing psychosis and believed he was saving them from a life of physical and sexual abuse.
Final arguments wrapped up Friday in Schoenborn’s annual review board hearing over the issue of granting him some freedoms. A decision is not expected before Nov. 17.
Psychiatrist Dr. Marcel Hediger, a member of Schoenborn’s treatment team, told the hearing his client still struggles with anger management, but the outbursts have become less frequent and less intense over the past six months.
Schoenborn has difficulty putting anger-control techniques he has learned into practice, but he has developed better insight into what causes him to react, Hediger said.
Hediger said it is possible, but unlikely he would recommend Schoenborn for escorted outings into the community within the next year.
Schoenborn has never been granted outings into the community, though the hospital where he lives has had the power to do so since 2015.
He sat slumped in a chair during parts of the hearing, wearing a blue sweater, torn jeans and slippers.
A 2015 review board decision said Schoenborn was diagnosed as having a delusional disorder and a substance-abuse disorder, but his symptoms had been in remission for many years.
Psychiatrist Dr. Stephen Hart, an expert witness for the Crown, told the hearing he doubted Schoenborn would be ready for escorted outings within the next two to three years, if ever.