Winnipeg boy, 3, to be taken off life support
Youngster suffered severe brain damage after allegedly being stabbed by man who was in an on-again-off-again relationship with mother
WINNIPEG — A three-year-old boy who was stabbed multiple times while he slept in his bed was to be taken off life support on Friday.
Roxanne Moar said her nephew, Hunter Haze Straight-Smith, was to be removed from the machines keeping him alive at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences Centre.
She said Hunter suffered severe brain damage during the brutal attack on Wednesday.
“My nephew didn’t do nothing to anyone. He was so happy and innocent,” Moar said in an online message.
Outside of the hospital on Friday afternoon, dozens of family friends and supporters gathered for a vigil. The boy’s mother, Clarice Smith, and other relatives hugged each other and wept during Indigenous prayers and drum songs.
“They’re very distraught,” family friend Darryl Contois said. “I too have kids, and to see a baby laying there that did no harm to no one really broke my heart.”
Daniel Jensen, 33, was charged with attempted murder on Thursday.
Police said that generally, a charge may be upgraded when a victim of a crime dies.
Jensen was also charged with assault for an altercation police allege occurred between him and Hunter’s mother.
Clarice Smith had been in an on-againoff-again relationship with Jensen for about six months. He is not Hunter’s father.
Police have said that at the time of the attack on the boy, Jensen was under a court order not to contact the mother.
Court records show he was charged with assault with a weapon and uttering threats in July. He was also charged this week with failure to comply with recognizance and probation orders.
A relative said Hunter’s mother had been planning to move home to Manigotagan, northeast of Winnipeg.
Police believe there was an argument between Smith and Jensen somewhere on Winnipeg’s Main Street. It was after that encounter that police allege that Jensen walked to the home where Hunter was asleep and stabbed him several times.
“I have no words to describe it. Nothing like this has ever happened in the family,” said Bianca Smith, another of Hunter’s aunts.
“It’s hard, really hard, on everybody.”