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CBC
29-05-2025
- General
- CBC
Judge to rule on Justin Bourque's alleged prison stabbing in September
A judge will rule in September whether Justin Bourque and another man are guilty of stabbing a third man with shanks in a prison three years ago. Bourque and Christian Clyke stood trial over two days in Miramichi provincial court on two charges alleging they had shanks, or homemade weapons, and assaulted Chase Spence at the Atlantic Institution on May 3, 2022. Bourque is serving life sentences at the maximum security prison southwest of Miramichi for the 2014 murders of three RCMP officers in Moncton. Bourque's lawyer Simon Wood gave a closing argument Thursday afternoon saying the Crown had failed to prove the allegations against the 35-year-old. Bourque offered no defence evidence and opted not to testify. Clyke, who doesn't have a lawyer, took the stand to testify and argued he acted in self-defence when he stabbed Spence because Spence had sent a note the day before threatening violence, and attacked Bourque first. Crown prosecutor Jean-Guy Savoie argued self-defence wouldn't apply even if Spence started the fight, saying it became a two-on-one attack with Spence trying to run and continued after he fell to the floor. After hearing the testimony from six Crown witnesses and Clyke himself, Judge Johanne-Marguerite Landry said she would need more time to consider her verdict. Landry is scheduled to give her decision on Sept. 10. The trial began Wednesday and much of the two-day trial focused on surveillance video that captured most of the events. It showed Chase Spence entering the prison unit with Bourque and Clyke around 1:30 p.m. Spence walked down a hall with cell doors as Bourque followed him. There appeared to be words exchanged, though the video had no audio, and Spence appeared to punch at Bourque's neck followed by Bourque pulling out a shank. Clyke said he wanted to testify about what transpired, telling the judge he acted in self-defence. Clyke told the judge that the day before, a note known as a "kite" was passed through a prison door from another unit that he was told had been sent by Spence. Clyke testified the note said he was moving to the unit with Clyke and Bourque, and that he would "take a run at," or attack, the first person he encountered. Clyke testified he passed the note around the unit after receiving it. He said he watched Spence walk down the hall and then attack Bourque before turning and running toward Clyke and other inmates. "As me and him got closer, he sliced at my arm and ran, and that's when I chased him," Clyke testified. Clyke testified he was cut or stabbed four times. He testified he chased Spence to stop his "spree" in the unit, but that he was also trying to take a weapon from him. "I wasn't stabbing at him the whole time," Clyke said. Testimony, video conflict Under cross-examination by Savoie, Clyke's version of events shifted and he couldn't be certain who caused his injuries. Savoie repeatedly played the video, noting Clyke could not have seen the initial interaction between Spence and Bourque because Clyke was around a corner. The questioning also probed the existence of the kite note. Savoie asked who was aware of its contents and why it wasn't reported to prison officials. Clyke then said he was only told by the inmate who received the note through a door who sent it, but couldn't remember the name of the inmate who got the note. He said it wasn't reported because of unwritten prison rules against snitching. Clyke said he didn't keep the note, but had passed it along to other inmates. "We just have your word for it?" Savoie asked about the note. "Pretty much," Clyke said. Bourque's lawyer briefly cross-examined Clyke, asking if he saw Bourque stab Spence while on the floor. "No," Clyke said. The trial has heard that Spence was stabbed several times. Medical records were entered as evidence, which Savoie told the judge show Spence had various minor wounds and one stab wound that penetrated his chest wall. Spence didn't testify in the trial. An RCMP officer testified that neither Spence nor the two accused provided statements to police. While the events at the centre of the trial occurred in May 2022, the charges were only laid in November 2023. Bourque is serving life sentences for fatally shooting RCMP constables Dave Ross, Fabrice Gevaudan and Douglas Larche and wounding constables Darlene Goguen and Eric Dubois in Moncton on June 4, 2014. In 2016, he called police and confessed to the killing. He was sentenced in 2019.
CBC
19-04-2025
- CBC
Sofyan Boalag provoked his own stabbing, attorney general says in court filings
Social Sharing A serial rapist who says he was left permanently disabled by a prison attack was the author of his own misfortune, according to a statement of defence filed by the Attorney General of Canada in federal court. Sofyan Boalag, whose spree of sexual assaults terrorized St. John's in 2012, is suing the federal government. He's alleging staff at a federal prison failed to protect him from a stabbing in February 2023, which left him unable to walk for the rest of his life. In a statement of defence, however, the feds say Boalag brought it on himself. Among the particulars of his "contributory negligence," the statement of defence claims: "[Boalag] failed to inform the [prison staff] of any risks to his personal safety," "He provoked the other inmate involved in the incident," "He failed to take reasonable steps to avoid the incident," "He failed to keep a proper lookout," "He failed to ensure his own safety," "He conducted himself in a reckless manner." The filing also claims Boalag got the date wrong in his statement of claim — saying the incident happened on Feb. 12, 2023, nine days after the date referenced in Boalag's filings. It also denied Boalag's claim that he'll never walk again, and put the onus on him to prove it. Boalag was convicted of raping two women and a 15-year-old girl in Newfoundland during the summer and fall of 2012. There were six complainants in total, with women describing how he choked them unconscious and threatened them with a knife on city streets in the early hours of the morning. He was convicted in 2016, and declared a dangerous offender by the courts — resulting in an indeterminate prison sentence. He was at the Atlantic Institution in Renous, N.B., at the time of the incident, but has since been moved to a prison in Ontario. Boalag says he was attacked from behind, failed by staff According to Boalag's lawsuit, filed by Halifax-area lawyer Laura Neilan, the inmates were released from their cells to line up for medication. Boalag says a man came up behind him, and he didn't see the attack coming. He says correctional officers failed to intervene in a timely fashion, leaving him vulnerable to multiple stabs from a "sharp weapon." The lawsuit claims the attacker was a man with "pre-indicators of violence" toward Boalag. It alleges prison staff failed to prevent weapons from entering the facility, failed to search inmates before allowing them to line up, and ignored internal policy by letting multiple inmates out of their cells at the same time. In its statement of defence, lawyers for the attorney general deny the claims, saying "at all times material it provided adequate supervision of inmates, including [Boalag]." They also say Boalag received "reasonable, necessary and adequate" medical assistance. They're asking a judge to dismiss his claim with costs awarded to the federal government. The statements made by Boalag and the attorney general have not yet been tested in court.
