Kachkar ‘wasn’t operating in our world’

Sgt. Ryan Russell murder case now up to jurors

turbed he was able to form the intent that is a necessary element of first-degree murder.

Under Section 16 of the Criminal Code of Canada, a person can’t be held criminally responsible if he suffers from a mental disorder that renders him incapable either of appreciating what’s called “the nature and quality of the act” (meaning could he understand the physical consequences of what he was doing?) or of knowing that it was morally wrong.

One of the less-understood presumptions in the law is that everyone is presumed not to suffer from a mental illness, meaning the burden of proof that an accused person does lies with the defence. not criminally responsible for Sgt. Russell’s tragic death.

As Mr. Richardson put it, “We say he was mentally disordered. He wasn’t operating in our world.”

If Sgt. Russell was a man in his prime — just 35, with a wife and baby son, newly promoted, respected and loved by colleagues — Mr. Richardson said, Mr. Kachkar was one in decline.

Where once he had a conventional life, by the time of his fatal encounter with Sgt. Russell, Mr. Kachkar was estranged from his family, homeless, unemployed, unkempt and increasingly bizarre.

By 2006, when social workers became involved with the family because of child-

The first hit of the plow knocked

Sgt. Russell off his feet, the second clipped his head

are three of them who testified here as experts — are the star arrows in Mr. Richardson’s quill, and the biggest coup of these is Dr. Philip Klassen, who was hired to assess Mr. Kachkar by the prosecutors, but called by Mr. Richardson as a defence witness.

Dr. Klassen agreed with what two forensic psychiatrists hired by Mr. Richardson found — Mr. Kachar was in the grips of such a serious mental disorder, likely what’s called psychotic disorder not otherwise specified or schizophrenia, that he couldn’t understand what he was doing that morning and isn’t criminally responsible.

“The doctors’ opinions are solid, evidence-based and they are uncontradicted,” Mr. Richardson told the jurors repeatedly.

In fact, prosecutors called five other psychiatrists, most of whom saw Mr. Klassen in jail only for short periods and only for the purposes of assessing whether he was suicidal, as “reply” witnesses.

These doctors, Mr. Richardson pointed out, found only that Mr. Kachkar wasn’t showing psychosis symptoms in the weeks and months after Sgt. Russell was killed, and were at a disadvantage because they didn’t spend the time the three psychiatrists did, or have access to the same records.

“If there was a contrary opinion,” Mr. Richardson said, with a psychiatrist saying Mr. Kachkar wasn’t psychotic at the time he was behind the wheel of the snowplow, “you’d have heard it. There isn’t.”

Neither was there any serious suggestion Mr. Kachkar was “malingering,” pretending to have or exaggerating his symptoms. “None of the tests showed it,” Mr. Richardson said. “The results are not in dispute.”

About 5 a.m. on Jan. 12, Mr. Kachkar fled the Toronto shelter where he was staying. Video footage shows him racing — without a coat, barefoot — out the back door, down a flight of stairs, and into the snow.

In short order, he ended up at a Tim Hortons, stole the idling snowplow and began a two-hour rampage of destruction across the city.

“Whatever slim hold Mr. Kachkar may have had on reality slips away,” Mr. Richardson said. “And he’s gone.”

So, within the hour, was Ryan Russell.

Friday, prosecutor Christine McGoey will address the jurors for the last time. They are expected to begin deliberations Monday. Winnipeg The Manitoba government says a personal care home company broke laws when it allowed its top executive to retire, then rehired him at higher pay. The province says the chief executive officer of Bethania Group Personal Care Homes retired from his job, started collecting pension and was rehired the next day with a raise. Health Minister Theresa Oswald says the company broke a provincial law governing publicly funded health bodies and has ordered the company to end the CEO’s contract. In a written statement, Bethania’s board of directors says the CEO’s contract was approved before the law took effect.