On the grim second anniversary of the deadly swarming of Kenneth Lee, one of the eight girls charged in the shocking crime sat in a downtown youth courtroom as lawyers discussed her future.
She was just 13 when she told her mom she was going to the movies — but instead, headed downtown with her friends where the night would end with a homeless man beaten and stabbed to death at a parkette at York and Front Sts., and the eight girls, between the ages of 13 and 16, charged with second-degree murder.
She was one of the youngest and the least involved.
In June, she pleaded guilty to assault causing bodily harm and assault with a weapon.
In an agreed statement of facts, she admitted kicking Lee, 59, and later throwing a plastic water bottle at him and “forcefully” hitting him twice in the head-neck area with a green bag as he lay “crumpled on the ground having just collapsed after being swarmed and attacked,” and as he “was trying to protect his head from the onslaught of kicks, stomps and punches” still being rained down on him by the others.
She and another girl who pleaded to manslaughter are asking Justice David Rose to stay their convictions because they were subject to unlawful strip searches where they were completely naked in violation of government policy.
If Rose rejects their Charter challenge, defence lawyer Karen Lau Po Hung asked that her client, now 15, be sentenced to 12 months probation on the assault charges, citing her remorse, community support and ongoing counselling. “She feels very bad and sad about the victim’s death,” she said. “She stated that she never would have thought that she’d be involved in the death of another person, and she regrets everything that happened.”
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But what about her pre-sentence report where she said she takes “partial” responsibility, the judge asked.
“I don’t know why it read like that, but I think what it probably means is that she took responsibility for her actions,” Lau Po Hung said. “She’s not taking responsibility for causing his death, which she ultimately didn’t plead to, but she’s taken accountability from the beginning.”
Her lawyer described her as “pleasant and co-operative” with a difficult upbringing: She grew up in a “notoriously impoverished” neighbourhood plagued with violence where a bullet once went through her bedroom, her brother was killed when she was young, her traumatized mother is raising her on her own and blames herself for letting her daughter go out that night.
After her daughter’s arrest, her mom reached out to supports in her community to get her the help she needs. “She is very aware of what she needs to do to make sure her daughter stays on the right path,” Lau Po Hung told the court.
Crown attorney Sarah De Filippis urged the judge to give the girl a custodial sentence: she suggested four months credit for the “very difficult” conditions she suffered during her 41 days in detention — including the three naked strip searches — leaving four months in open custody and four of community supervision.
It seems a tough ask — considering Rose has already sentenced two of the girls who pleaded guilty to the more serious charge of manslaughter to periods of probation — one to 15 months and the other to 21 months, though both are in an Intensive Support and Supervision Program — while finding that “further incarceration would serve no lawful purpose.”
The prosecutor agreed this teen played a lesser role than most of her co-accused — she didn’t “relish” the violence the same way the others did and unlike those who seemed undisturbed as they later watched surveillance video of the poor man being swarmed, she was “clearly appreciating the enormity of the situation.”
There’s hope, everyone seemed to be saying, that she can still rewrite her life. But if she’s granted a stay?
Final arguments in the girls’ Charter challenge are expected Thursday.