Rose admits he did wrong in Sawa death

Cale Rose says he pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the death of Kelvin Sawa because he wanted to accept responsibility for what he did.

“I wanted to get it off my shoulders,” Rose testified Thursday in the Superior Court of Justice in Welland.

He was an inmate at the Niagara Detention Centre on Aug. 15, 2011, the day Sawa was found hanging in cell No. 10 of 2 Wing, a maximum security area inside the Thorold jail.

Rose has been called by the Crown to testify in Jeremy Hall’s second-degree murder trial, also in connection with Sawa’s death. Hall has pleaded not guilty.

Rose began his testimony Wednesday. Court was told he was in jail on a firearms charge involving his girlfriend and had been in jail for about nine months before becoming involved with the Sawa incident.

Sawa, a 46-year-old taxi driver from Port Colborne, was found unconscious hanging from a rope inside his cell. He was taken to hospital, where he died a few days later.

Rose, 31, was interviewed by police more than once regarding this case. The first time was in 2011, and another was March 19, 2015, shortly before he pled guilty to manslaughter on March 27.

The jury was told Hall and Rose were both originally charged with second-degree murder.

Later, Rose struck a deal with the Crown and agreed to enter a guilty plea to the lesser charge of manslaughter, with one of the conditions being that he testify at Hall’s trial.

Defence lawyer Dirk Derstine spent time Thursday reviewing statements Rose had given to police during his video interviews and video surveillance tapes from the jail at the time of the incident.

Several times, the defence was able to show Rose’s version of events varied somewhat from what was shown on a video surveillance recording from inside the jail. Rose confirmed Hall had been working out in the TV day room that day, and once he finished he took a rope made from a torn bed sheet and made a noose. A number of inmates were in the room at the time and joked about taking the noose and dropping it off at Sawa’s cell.

Sawa was in jail after being arrested on a sexual assault charge involving another male.

On Wednesday, Rose said Hall told him to deliver the noose to Sawa. But when he was cross-examined by the defence Thursday, he said Hall could have told him that or it might have come from someone else who was in the room at that time. Also on Thursday, the six-man, sixwoman jury spent a considerable amount of time out of the courtroom while the lawyers discussed a number of legal issues where the judge had to make a ruling before they were able to continue.

The trial continues Friday in front of Justice Joseph Henderson, but most of the day is expected to be spent on legal issues.