Detective details blood trail in homicide
Jury hears that a third man was convicted for manslaughter two years ago in the Carel Douse case
Four bloodstains found inside the illegal after-hours bar where Carel Douse was allegedly stabbed did not, in fact, belong to the victim — but five others did.
The jury in the first-degree murder trial heard Monday that blood belonging to Douse was discovered by Hamilton police forensic detectives in locations, including on the floor and on the front door that opened onto King Street East.
The nine swabs of suspected bloodstains from inside More Than a Haircut barbershop were processed for DNA at the Centre of Forensic Sciences in Toronto.
“If we saw blood, we swabbed it,” testified Hamilton forensic detective Michael Eves.
He added that investigators searched the basement of the barbershop, finding it empty, and rifled through garbage in the alley out back of it.
He said the forensic team took 319 photos inside the makeshift club that had been serving drinks without a liquor licence.
The Crown has told the jury that Douse had been inside the club when three men rushed the door and attacked him at about 3 a.m. on May 18, 2019.
The officer detailed how investigators traced a blood trail, just after 4 a.m. that same morning, from the porch of a house nearby on East Avenue North, where Douse’s body was found, south toward the club.
“We began to follow a drip trail of blood on the sidewalk, small drops … using bright white flashlights. We marked them and chalked the edge of the sidewalk.”
The trail grew more sparse, he said, as it got closer to the barbershop. Officers marked blood droplets on the sidewalk in front of the club, and on the road at the intersection of King and East Avenue, where Douse was seen on security video allegedly fleeing three men.
The blood belonged to Douse, a finding agreed upon by defence lawyers representing the two accused, Daniel Wise and Alieu Jeng. This evidence was among an agreed statement of facts presented to the jury Monday.
Among the other agreed upon facts, is that a third man recorded on video with Wise and Jeng that morning, Samatar Hassan, pled guilty to manslaughter on April 9, 2021, in relation to Douse’s death.
Included in the statement of facts, is a photo taken by a security camera inside a taxi the morning of Douse’s death; Jeng sits in the front passenger seat, and Wise and Hassan in the back.
No other details about the Hassan plea were provided to the jury. Justice Toni Skarica told the jury it can make “limited use” of the information, and he will be instructing them further about how it may be considered in their deliberations.
The trial is expected to conclude this week. The Crown has told the jury Douse was stabbed a total of 19 times, but has not presented evidence that a murder weapon was ever found.
Witnesses have testified they saw lacerations on Douse’s face, but no visible signs of bleeding.
On Monday, Crown attorney Brian Adsett asked Eves to show the jury a small knife that was found in the dirt near the porch where Douse was found wounded.
Eves stood before the jurors, holding the palm-sized, switchblade style knife in his gloved hand.
Earlier in the trial, defence lawyers questioned a forensic investigator at length about why that knife was not tested for blood.
The investigator, Lauren Troubridge, said the knife was partially buried in the dirt, and that while it was collected, she did not believe it could have been involved with the stabbing.