Paramedic on trial dismissed firefighters from helping dying teen, trial hears
Christine Rankin | CBC News | Posted: January 14, 2021 3:03 PM | Last Updated: January 14, 2021
Paramedics thought the wound was a BB gun injury
Former paramedic Steven Snively says he dismissed firefighters from the scene of a shooting where a Hamilton teen lay dying because it felt like a call he and his partner could manage.
Snively is one of two paramedics accused of not properly caring for Yosif Al-Hasnawi, who died from a gunshot the night of Dec. 2, 2017. He testified in his own defence in an Ontario Superior Court trial on Thursday.
"You guys are clear, and you're free to go," Snively remembered saying to a firefighter. Al-Hasnawi, didn't seem to be in distress, he said.
Less than an hour later the 19-year-old, a Brock university medical sciences student, would be dead.
The court has heard the paramedics thought Al-Hasnawi was shot with a BB or pellet gun. In fact, he had been shot by a .22-caliber handgun, and the bullet pierced an artery and vein.
Al-Hasnawi was shot at Main and Sanford in Hamilton's lower city at 8:55 p.m. that night and was pronounced dead at St. Joseph's Hospital at 9:58 p.m.
Snively and Christopher Marchant are charged with failing to provide him the necessaries of life.
Small wound
Marchant was the primary attendant on the call. Snively was the ambulance driver and first paramedic to make contact with Al-Hasnawi.
He described wedging his way through people at the scene to get to Al-Hasnawi's side. No one was providing care, he said.
Snively said Al-Hasnawi's pulse was strong, but he had a "small wound" next to his belly button. He said there wasn't any blood, but it looked moist "as if someone had picked a scab." He remembered pressing on the teen's abdomen to check for distension or see if he was in pain.
"He didn't seem to squirm or move aside. He just kind of laid there," Snively said.
He gathered more information about Al-Hasnawi's vitals and passed it to Marchant, who took over patient care.
There wasn't "any hesitation" by the firefighters when he dismissed them, Snively remembered.
'I can find a pellet on the ground'
The former paramedic left to wheel the stretcher closer. When he returned, he saw Mahdi, Al-Hasnawi's younger brother, attempting to lift the teen off the ground from behind. Snively said he grabbed for Al-Hasnawi's legs, and the teen was moved near the stretcher.
When he spoke to a bystander to gather information, Snively said he asked questions about a gun, including whether there was a muzzle flash seen.
He said the teenager replied, no, and used the words "pellet gun" to describe the weapon.
Snively also testified he heard a police officer "distinctly" say to Al-Hasnawi, "stop acting, if I look hard enough I can find a pellet on the ground."
Bleeding teen was restrained, bound to the stretcher
Snively said he and Marchant made repeated attempts to get Al-Hasnawi onto the stretcher, but couldn't succeed because of the teen's movements.
Once in the back of the ambulance, Snively said he tried to ask Al-Hasnawi questions and reassure him. The teen appeared distressed, Snively said, so he told him, "we're here to help you."
Snively remembered saying to Marchant that there was "something going on" related to his behaviour.
At one point, Snively said, Al-Hasnawi ended up kneeing him in the chest.
"I know it wasn't deliberate. It was just him moving around," he said.
"I know it wasn't deliberate. It was just him moving around," he said.
Sgt. Nesreen Shawihat, a Hamilton police officer, had also entered the back of the ambulance. He recalled she said something to the teenager akin to "I understand you want to be a doctor" and "stop acting this way or I'm going to have to restrain you."
Al-Hasnawi was restrained to the stretcher.
Snively is an occasional hunter and has a Possession and Acquisition Licence. The court has heard he's seen BB gun wounds before.
Snively's testimony follows Marchant, who completed his third straight day of testimony on Thursday.
During the Crown's cross-examination, Marchant maintained that he thought Al-Hasnawi was experiencing a psychiatric emergency.
This isn't what he wrote on his ambulance call report, the court heard. Marchant testified that he incorrectly wrote the chief complaint as a penetrating trauma.
He also didn't lead with it on his patch call to St. Joseph's Hospital, the court heard. He first described Al-Hasnawi's wound, though used the words "extremely confused" and "extremely altered" later in the call.
The Crown also said Marchant provided blood oxygen saturation data that was "seven-minutes old" and "unreliable," but the former paramedic didn't note this to the hospital.
'You're guessing,' Crown tells defendant
Al-Hasnawi started to crash during the call, and his heart rate plummeted. Marchant said alcohol, drugs, excited delirium, or even a head injury were considered as causes.
"You're trying to invent, you're guessing, you're making up possibilities...other than the obvious cause, which was shock," Crown attorney Scott Patterson said.
"I ruled out the penetrating trauma with my reassessment in the back [of the ambulance]...that wasn't the route I was going down," Marchant said. "It was the behavioural/psychiatric route."
Data tracking the ambulance shows that it stopped at a red light at the intersection of Main Street East and Wentworth Street South on the way to the hospital. The ambulance's lights and sirens weren't on, the Crown said, and it appeared the driver, Snively, didn't know Al-Hasnawi had already crashed.
Marchant has described Al-Hasnawi as an "uncooperative" patient. On Wednesday, he acknowledged he felt, in part, responsible for the teen's death.
The trial began at John Sopinka Courthouse in Hamilton on Nov. 24, and is continuing online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The trial will be decided by Justice Harrison Arrell alone.
Crown attorneys are Scott Patterson and Linda Shin.
The defence is Jeffrey Manishen of Hamilton and Michael DelGobbo of St. Catharines.
The person who shot Al-Hasnawi, Dale King, was acquitted last year of second-degree murder. That case is being appealed.