Bacon to admit role in murders
Red Scorpion gangster strikes plea deal in 2007 Surrey Six highrise slaughter
Red Scorpion gangster Jamie Bacon will plead guilty Thursday to playing a role in the 2007 Surrey Six murders, as well as counselling someone to shoot an associate in 2008, Postmedia has learned.
Crown prosecutors and defence lawyers involved in both cases appeared via telephone before B.C. Supreme Court Associate Chief Justice Heather Holmes on Monday to tell her they had worked out a plea deal.
They didn’t lay out the details of the agreement, but said more information would be provided when Bacon appears via video link on Thursday at 2 p.m.
A Postmedia reporter was the only person in Courtroom 54 for the brief appearance, aside from Holmes and a sheriff. Bacon did not appear via video or in person.
Kevin Westell, one of Bacon’s lawyers, said later Monday that he couldn’t disclose the specifics of the plea deal until Thursday’s court appearance. But he said “both sides worked diligently towards a disposition that we think meets the ends of justice. You’ll have to wait for the details.”
Chris Johnson, another defence lawyer for Bacon, told Holmes
that the Crown and defence had reached an agreement on sentencing.
“We have arrived at a disposition on both of these matters with our learned friends in the Crown and we are proposing sentencing by way of joint submission,” he said.
Both sides then strategized on how to combine the plea and sentencing hearings given that Bacon is mid-trial on the charge of counselling to commit murder.
That jury trial, related to the attempt to kill his former associate Dennis Karbovanec on Dec. 31, 2008, was adjourned in March due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
It was expected to resume in August.
Then on May 21, the B.C. Court of Appeal ordered a new trial for Bacon on counts of conspiracy and first-degree murder in the Surrey Six case.
He was originally charged on April 3, 2009 in the Oct. 19, 2007 slaughter in a Surrey highrise. But on Dec. 1, 2017, Justice Kathleen Ker stayed both charges after a defence application that was heard in secret.
The appeal court ruled that Ker had overstated police misconduct in the investigation and that, despite serious problems with the probe, it was in the public interest to have a “full trial of the charges on their merits.”
Two of Bacon’s fellow Red Scorpions gang associates — Cody Haevischer and Matthew Johnston — were convicted in 2014 of first-degree murder and conspiracy. They are both appealing.
Their trial heard that Bacon ordered a hit on rival drug trafficker
Corey Lal that spiralled out of control when Haevischer, Johnston and a man identified as Person X arrived at the Balmoral Tower to kill Lal and also shot his brother Michael, associates Ryan Bartolomeo and Eddie Narong, and bystanders Ed Schellenberg and Chris Mohan.
Prosecutor Bob Wright suggested Monday that the best way to proceed with the plea agreement would be to get a new direct indictment sworn related to both the Surrey Six case and the attempt on Karbovanec. That way, the earlier charges would be stayed and both cases could be heard by a single judge.
“There is going to be a suggestion for a global sentence and a concurrent sentencing on the counselling,” Wright said. “Because of the profile of this, and the many members of the public and families that are going to be involved that we need to co-ordinate with, it would certainly be easier to have it in front of one judge.”
Holmes thanked both sides for their efforts to resolve the cases.
“It goes without saying that the court thanks you for what I’m sure has been a huge amount of work that’s gone into this,” she said.
Bacon has been in jail since his 2009 arrest in the Surrey Six case. However, part of the time he’s spent in custody over the last 11 years was serving his sentence for 10 gun convictions.
On Dec. 17, 2010, he was sentenced to seven years minus three years and four months’ pretrial credit on the firearms counts after guns were found in a secret compartment of a vehicle he regularly drove in April 2007.
Bacon is expected to get double credit for pretrial custody because he was arrested before routine two-for-one credit was eliminated by the former Conservative government.