Guilty plea in ‘senseless’ fatal beating

A Whitby man who beat another man to death over a lost ring and $100 has pleaded guilty to manslaughter.

Jason Noel, 20, faced a second- degree murder charge in the death of Alfred Dennis, 49, on June 10, 2004. Dennis died of injuries suffered five days earlier, when he was beaten on the head and upper chest in front of friends in his Oshawa rooming house.

Superior Court Justice Ronald Richards yesterday accepted Noel’s plea to the lesser offence after Noel agreed to a statement of facts outlining what the Crown called a “ brutal, senseless, needless and unnecessary attack.” Crown prosecutor Mitchell Flagg said Noel, who had been drinking and using drugs, went to Dennis’s rooming house early on the morning of June 5 and accused him of stealing a ring and $ 100. When Dennis denied the charge, Flagg said, the much younger and bigger man started beating him. The beating was witnessed by two friends who had been drinking and doing drugs in Dennis’s room on King St. W. in downtown Oshawa. They said Dennis, who had been drinking and using drugs as well, tried to fight off Noel.

Noel left the rooming house, warning the occupants not to call police or seek help for their dazed friend, who was by then bloodied and incoherent.

Flagg said Noel returned a couple of hours later with a couple of beers and started asking Dennis again about the allegedly stolen property.

“ They ( Dennis and Noel) laughed and joked around a bit,” Flagg said, but then Noel started beating him again. With his friends’ help, Dennis made his way to the apartment of the building superintendent, whom Noel also told not to seek help. The superintendent did call for help and Dennis was rushed to hospital for treatment of a brain hemorrhage and other injuries. He died five days later.

Flagg asked the court for a sentence at the high end of a range of four to nine years, because of the brutality of the attacks, the fact they took place over such a trivial thing, and because Noel told others not to seek help for the victim.

Noel will be sentenced Oct. 19.