Autism not cause for rampage: Crown says

Incidental to Minassian's mania, court told

The man who killed 10 people by deliberately driving down pedestrians on a Toronto sidewalk in 2018 is a mass murderer who happened to have autism spectrum disorder, the prosecution said Friday.

Crown attorney Joe Callaghan said in closing arguments that Alek Minassian's case “is about a person who committed mass murder who happened to have ASD, not that the ASD made him commit murders.”

The six-week judge-alone trial, held by video conference due to the pandemic, concluded Friday. Justice Anne Molloy will give her verdict March 3.

Minassian has pleaded not guilty to 10 counts of first-degree murder and 16 of attempted murder. He has admitted to planning and carrying out the April 23 attack.

The central question is whether Minassian knew what he did was morally wrong, and the legal test focuses on whether he had the capacity at the time to make a rational choice.

Boris Bytensky, Minassian's lawyer, said in closing arguments Thursday that his client's autism spectrum disorder left him incapable of making a rational choice at the time.

But Callaghan pointed to a comment Minassian made in an examination: “It's, well, wrong in the sense that is immoral.”

Minassian told numerous psychiatrists and psychologists he didn't feel compelled to commit the attack and does not suffer from any other illnesses, psychotic or otherwise.

“There's no evidence he ever lost the fact of the wrongness of his actions,” Callaghan said.

Minassian told mental health experts he had a strong desire to commit a mass killing, was lonely, was worried he'd fail at his upcoming software development job, had a belief he'd never have a relationship with a woman, had an infatuation with a mass murderer and — what many point to as his biggest motivator — had a desire for notoriety.

The prosecutor also noted that Minassian had thought about committing a mass murder for years and has fixated on school shootings since high school.

Callaghan said Minassian had years to think about it, and weeks after he reserved a rental van on April 6.

The plan, Callaghan said, was “rent van, drive van down street and kill people,” Callaghan said.

Callaghan noted the testimony of Dr. John Bradford, a renowned Canadian forensic psychiatrist who has assessed some of the country's most infamous murderers from Robert Pickton to Paul Bernardo and Russell Williams.

Bradford also said Minassian did not get to the level required to be found not criminally responsible, but he did allow for a “theoretical” pathway to that finding.