Firefighters were turned away and a paramedic laughed as shot teen lay dying, court hears
Christine Rankin | CBC News | Posted: December 16, 2020 3:02 PM | Last Updated: December 18, 2020
2 paramedics are charged with failing to provide the necessaries of life
All three Hamilton firefighters who were dispatched to the area of Sanford Avenue and Main Street East on Dec. 2, 2017, say they were ready to help Yosif Al-Hasnawi, but were turned away by other first responders.
Grant McQueen was the third firefighter in an Ontario Superior Court trial of two former Hamilton paramedics to describe what happened the night Al-Hasnawi was shot and killed.
Firefighters aboard Rescue 1 exited their truck with their medical bags and defibrillator, but were given a "wave off" by a police officer, McQueen testified on Wednesday. A paramedic later released them from the scene.
The court has heard this twice before from firefighter Mark Vanspronsen and Captain Mark Stevens.
It's a landmark trial where two former Hamilton paramedics — Christopher Marchant, 32, and Steven Snively, 55 — are charged with failing to provide the necessaries of life in relation to their treatment of 19-year-old Al-Hasnawi. They have pleaded not guilty.
The paramedics thought Al-Hasnawi was shot with a BB gun, the court has heard, at 8:55 p.m. But in fact, it was a .22-calibre handgun, and the hollow-point bullet hit an artery and vein.
Al-Hasnawi was pronounced dead at St. Joseph's Hospital at 9:58 p.m.
McQueen said the firefighters received a medical call for someone who had been hit by a BB gun or pellet gun, though he couldn't remember the exact wording.
He told the court he wasn't sure why the officer had raised his hand, palm open toward the firefighters once they arrived. But when they saw the hand, the firefighters stopped.
He remembered the police officer saying, "It's just a pellet gun" or "It's just a BB gun" in a firm voice. Al-Hasnawi was lying on the ground about 10 feet away from them and between the officer's legs, McQueen said.
He was "agitated" and holding his stomach while rocking back and forth, he said, and "His face looked stressed. He looked anxious."
Though McQueen saw Al-Hasnawi's wound when an officer lifted up his shirt — he described it as "smaller than a dime" with a bit of blood pooled in the wound itself — the firefighters didn't get any closer.
He remembered an older man saying something akin to "that's a gun shot. He needs to go to the hospital."
The firefighters asked questions to get a general picture of what happened, McQueen said. Two paramedics arrived, and he remembers speaking to the younger one.
"We were still trying to figure out what was going on," McQueen said he told him.
But he gave the information he had, which included that it was a small wound and that the weapon was a BB gun. He doesn't remember if he told the paramedic that the officer was the one who gave this information.
"He seemed very certain that that's what it was," McQueen said of the officer. When asked by Jeffrey Manishen, Marchant's representation, McQueen said that he would hold information from another first responder to a higher level than from a bystander.
Then one paramedic told the firefighters,"we're good" or "we have it from here," McQueen said. Since the paramedics are the higher medical authority, the firefighters started to leave.
When he went to pick up the medical bags they had brought, he saw the older paramedic attempting to hoist Al-Hasnawi off the ground. The paramedic grabbed the teenager's wrists, yanked upward, and set him back down, he said.
He heard the paramedic say, "He's acting. He's pretending."
He also said Al-Hasnawi replied, "Then, why does it hurt so much?"
When Crown Linda Shin asked how certain he was that the older paramedic said this, McQueen replied "100 per cent." When she asked about Al-Hasnawi's response, McQueen said he was "completely sure."
'It's just a mosquito bite'
Two bystanders who live near Sanford and Main also testified on Wednesday.
Hamilton resident Anthony DiCiccio was watching TV at his apartment that night when his girlfriend banged on the door.
DiCiccio remembered her saying, "Somebody got shot, somebody got shot." He didn't see any commotion when he looked out the window, but he could hear sirens approaching.
Once outside, DiCiccio saw who he thought were friends and family members of Al-Hasnawi and an officer. The people were crying, and the officer was trying to "settle down the scene."
He also remembers one of the paramedics laughing.
"Still to this day, I remember one of them saying, 'Don't worry. You're going to live. It's nothing serious. It's just a mosquito bite.' Hands down that's what I remember," he said.
Janis Cort was watching all of this unfold from her balcony. Her grandson called her out there after he saw the shooting. Cort said the noise sounded like a "firecracker."
There were so many people gathered that Cort couldn't see exactly what was happening. But she stayed listening from her balcony.
Among the things she heard was a male voice saying, "Help him." Then at one point, she also heard "all kinds of laughter."
"I was disgusted. I didn't think it was funny," Cort said.
DiCiccio was below and said he saw when Al-Hasnawi was lifted off the ground.
"He wasn't saying nothing. His face looked like he was in a great deal of pain. His eyes were closed," he said, though he couldn't remember how it happened.
The court has seen the footage of the scene, where an officer and a paramedic try to lift Al-Hasnawi off the ground, but don't succeed. Al-Hasnawi's younger brother Madhi steps in, and a group helps him lift the teenager and move him off camera and toward the ambulance.
Cort watched the police put up yellow caution tape, and the ambulance left without lights or sirens, she said. That same night, she heard on the news that Al-Hasnawi had died.
"And how did that make you feel?" asked Crown Scott Patterson.
"Angry," she said.
Mustafa Ameer, a teenager mosque member who was there the night Al-Hasnawi was shot, testified on Tuesday. He remembered Al-Hasnawi, whom he had known for years, asking something along the lines of "is this how I die?"
On Thursday, Dr. Elena Bulakhtina, who performed the autopsy, and a manager with the dispatch centre are scheduled to testify.
The superior court trial is expected to take five weeks, and Justice Harrison Arrell will render a verdict.
The Crown attorneys are Scott Patterson and Linda Shin. Jeffrey Manishen of Hamilton represents Marchant and Michael DelGobbo of St. Catharines represents Snively.
The trial began on Nov. 24 at John Sopinka Courthouse in Hamilton and will break for Christmas.
The person who shot Al-Hasnawi, Dale King, was acquitted last year of second-degree murder. That case is being appealed.