Defence witness says other man fired shots that killed Stampeder
Murder suspect Nelson Lugela wasn’t the gunman who fired two shots into Calgary Stampeders’ defensive back Mylan Hicks, a witness suggested Tuesday.
Shelley Stevenson, a bartender at Marquee Beer Market, said she was outside having a cigarette after closing time when she witnessed a melee among some patrons.
Stevenson, called as a defence witness by Lugela’s lawyer, Alain Hepner, said she was pushed out of the way as three or four men were scuffling outside the nightclub.
“It kind of looked like one guy was going to tackle another guy,” she said.
During the scuffle some glass was broken, which ended up on top of her feet, which were clad in flipflops.
Stevenson then began making her way south toward a second door to escape the melee.
“And then I heard someone say, ‘Where’s the gun, do you have the gun?’ ” she said.
Stevenson said she turned to see what was going on. “I saw a man holding the gun,” she said. “He was fairly close to me.”
She said the man had the weapon in his right hand.
“I just remember him putting it up (and) shooting it ... four times,” Stevenson said.
“I don’t know what he was shooting, it just happened so quickly.”
She told Hepner she first saw the man holding his arm by his side before raising the gun and firing.
“The shots went off and all of a sudden people were screaming.”
Stevenson said she then ran in the opposite direction.
“He was wearing the red vest.” A friend of Lugela’s with him that night, Dhia-Al-Hage Mohammed, was wearing a red vest in the club.
She said the man in the red vest and his friend, wearing a white, short-sleeve shirt with a collar, had been rude to customers earlier on.
Lugela was wearing a white polo shirt that evening.
“He was beside the guy in the red vest,” Stevenson told Hepner.
“The shooter was the guy in the red vest?” Hepner asked. “Yes,” she replied. Lugela, 21, is charged with second-degree murder in the death of Hicks, who was shot twice outside the club as he and teammates were leaving after celebrating a midseason win.
Under cross-examination by Crown prosecutor Tom Spark, Stevenson admitted she wasn’t certain who the shooter was.
“I can’t exactly remember who had the gun,” she said.
Dash cam video from a cab parked outside the club appears to capture Lugela fleeing with a gun in hand.
It’s the Crown’s theory he, not Mohammed, was the gunman.
Justice Keith Yamauchi will receive written arguments from counsel next week and oral submissions in January.
Meanwhile, Hicks’ mom, Renee Hill, spoke publicly for the first time since the trial began.
“I know that there’s more to come, so I’ll dig deeper,” she said, of the fact the evidentiary portion of the trial ended.
She said it was a tragic irony her son was slain in the relative safety of Canada instead of the mean streets of Detroit, where he grew up. “Don’t get me wrong I’m not trashing our city ... but if Mylan was gonna get hurt, lose his life, I’d be the first to say ... Detroit.”