Man enters manslaughter plea days into murder trial
Days into his trial for murder in the beating death of a Calgary youth, Trent Guy Hynne entered an unexpected plea to manslaughter Wednesday.
Hynne, who was charged with second-degree murder in the death of Juliano Crawford-Vieira, admitted taking part in killing the 17-year-old on March 8, 2014.
Defence lawyer Gavin Wolch said the plea was the result of both sides reviewing the evidence of witnesses who testified over the course of five days.
“Similar to the Crown, we always review the case and consider where we’re at in terms of the evidence,” Wolch said outside court following Hynne’s guilty plea.
“The result here was fair, it’s fair I think from everybody’s perspective,” he said.
“We’ve all heard the evidence and (the decision to plead guilty) was come to very carefully.”
Wolch wouldn’t concede manslaughter was the only possible conclusion Justice Rosemary Nation would have come to had the trial continued to its scheduled end next week.
“It’s difficult to say as there were still witnesses (to be called),” he said.
But he said Hynne will be happy to get closure on the case.
“After the amount of time that’s passed, he’ll be very relieved to finally be able to move on with his life and eventually rejoin society,” Wolch said.
“Our position was always that this was at most a manslaughter.”
Crown prosecutors Meagan Blake and Mike Ewenson declined to discuss their reasoning for taking the plea in advance of sentencing submissions on Friday.
On Nov. 7, in her opening address to Nation, Blake said a fight at a house party escalated to CrawfordVieira and his friend, Orest Tako, being badly outnumbered.
“What began as a six-on-four screaming match quickly became a six-on-two group attack, wherein members of the attacking group pursued Crawford-Vieira and Tako,” she told court.
“The attack was a continuation of a dispute several weeks earlier at Lord Beaverbrook High School.”
Tako, 17, survived the stabbing that occurred in a home in the 11400 block of Braniff Green S.W.
Hynne, 21, was also charged with attempting to murder him.
As part of the plea agreement, he also admitted to a charge of aggravated assault on Tako.
Crawford-Vieira was stabbed four times and “took his last breath as the EMT arrived. Resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful,” Blake said.
Two youths were earlier convicted of manslaughter for their roles in Crawford-Vieira’s death.