Gang member guilty in Haiart killing
Jeff Cansanay was convicted Thursday evening of second-degree murder and three counts of discharging a firearm with intent to wound in the shooting death of Phil Haiart, the son of a city doctor.
He was acquitted of two counts of attempted murder.
Haiart, 17, died of a gunshot wound to the stomach after he was shot near the intersection of Sargent Avenue and Maryland Street on the night of Oct. 10, 2005.
The five-woman, seven-man jury believed that Cansanay fired shots intended for gang members outside a home at 606 McGee St. in the city's West End. The bullets missed their intended targets but one struck Haiart.
A man who was walking with Haiart at the time was also injured.
Jurors began deliberating at 4:40 p.m. CT Wednesday and returned a verdict by 8:50 p.m. Thursday. The trial began March 18.
Cansanay sat stone-faced as the verdict was announced. One of his family members cried softly shortly after the decision was read.
The verdict concludes what was Cansanay's second trial. His first in 2007 collapsed after witnesses refused to testify. A judge acquitted him after the Crown was not allowed to show jurors videotaped statements witnesses had made to police that implicated Cansanay.
The acquittal was overturned by the Manitoba Court of Appeal. Cansanay's appeal of that decision went all the way to the Supreme Court before it was quashed.
Gang war over drugs
The underpinning of the Crown's case was that mounting tensions between Winnipeg's African Mafia and Mad Cowz gangs led to the shooting.
Just months before Haiart was killed, some members of the Mad Cowz split to form the African Mafia because of an internal leadership dispute.
The two gangs were battling for drug turf in the city's West End. The home on McGee Street was the scene of two gang-related shootings and a firebombing in the days prior to Haiart's death. Police said they were never notified of the violence taking place there.
The Crown called several current and former high-ranking members of the Mad Cowz to the witness stand, but only one of them said they remembered anything about the night they were shot at.
Gharib Abdullah — a parolee currently facing deportation from Canada for prior convictions — testified he and another Mad Cowz gang member, Cory Amyotte, went to the McGee Street home where they were confronted outside by Cansanay and a teen named Corey Spence.
Cansanay, he said, was carrying a rifle.
Abdullah said shots were fired, but he and Amyotte fled so quickly that he couldn't be certain who pulled the trigger.
Abdullah was the only witness who placed a weapon in Cansanay's hands.
Amyotte also took the stand but maintained he wasn't at the crime scene. Jurors were then shown a video of his police statement where he implicated Cansanay.
Deportation likely
Spence was convicted of second-degree murder in 2007 for his role in Haiart's killing and was sentenced as an adult to life in prison without eligibility for parole for seven years.
Cansanay's murder conviction means he's facing a mandatory sentence life in prison without parole eligibility for at least 10 years. A sentencing hearing will be held later this year.
As a permanent resident who immigrated to Canada from the Philippines in 1994, Cansanay also faces deportation after his sentence expires.
He is already fighting a deportation order issued after a prior conviction. Immigration proceedings begin again in May.
Crown witness 'a violent liar': defence
In his closing statement on Thursday, defence lawyer Greg Brodsky urged the jury to dismiss Abdullah's testimony, saying it wasn't credible.
'Lying comes easy to these people.' —Defence lawyer Greg Brodsky
Jurors heard that Abdullah and Amyotte were convicted of contempt of court after refusing to testify at Cansanay's first trial.
Amyotte was handed a four-year prison term, Abdullah served three years.
The two were acquitted last summer on charges of obstructing justice, but the Crown is appealing that decision.
Abdullah only testified at the latest trial in hopes of staving off deportation and further jail time, Brodsky alleged.
"He told the story that the Crown wants you to hear," Brodsky said, calling Abdullah "a violent liar when it suits him."
"Lying comes easy to these people," the veteran lawyer said.
Mistrial denied
Jurors never heard that the second trial was in danger of falling apart after Crown attorney Gerry Bowering mentioned Spence's murder conviction in a question he asked a witness during the trial's third week.
Brodsky immediately asked for a mistrial and argued during a lengthy voir dire that Bowering's statement tainted the jurors' ability to judge the evidence impartially.
A voir dire is a session where jurors are removed from the court and lawyers ask for rulings on motions, evidence and other legal procedures in their absence.
But Justice Shawn Greenberg disagreed and denied Brodsky's request, saying that a strong caution to the jury to not consider the lawyers' statements or questions as evidence would be enough to steer them away from tainting the trial's outcome.
Greenberg said the comment "happened so fast" that she didn't even hear it. "It happened ... in a split second," she said.
A mistrial would only have been declared as a last resort, she said in her ruling.
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