Man who fatally stabbed stranger on Stanley Park boardwalk is criminally responsible: judge

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A man who admitted to fatally stabbing a stranger on the Stanley Park seawall has missed an attempt to have a judge find him criminally not responsible due to a mental disorder.

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Tyler Anthony Lagimodiere was initially charged with first degree murder in connection with the murder of Lubomir Kunik, 61, in February 2017.

In December 2019, Lagimodiere pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor of murder in the second degree, but when the sentencing hearing began in July 2020, he created a court scene and indicated that he wanted to withdraw his statement.

After he got a change of lawyers, he asked the court to find him criminally not liable.

The defense position was that Lagimodiere was suffering from schizophrenia at the time and while the mental disorder did not render him incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of his actions, it did mean that he did not have the ability to know that the murder was wrong. .

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The Crown argued that the application could not be successful because admissible evidence to support the finding of incapacity was lacking and the expert evidence in support of the application was unreliable.

Two psychiatrists, one from the defense and one from the Crown, testified in court and reached different conclusions.

In her ruling on Friday, British Columbia Supreme Court Judge Laura Gerow accepted that Lagimodiere had a mental disorder at the time of the crime, but found that it was probably not schizophrenia. The judge also found that the mental disorder, which included Lagimodiere with auditory hallucinations, did not render him incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of his actions.

Regarding the question of whether he knew that his actions were morally wrong, the judge noted that the only admissible evidence regarding the motive for the murder came from the offender’s confession to undercover police officers. Lagimodiere had told undercover police that he had killed Kunik, a West End resident and amateur photographer, because he was tired of hearing the voices in his head telling him to abuse children. He wanted to make an “example” of the voices but the voices did not tell him to commit the murder, he told police.

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When asked by an undercover cop to describe how he selected the victim, he said that he was not looking for anyone in particular and that the victim could have been anyone, but not a woman or a child.

On the day of the murder, Lagimodiere told undercover officers that he grabbed a machete and hid it in his pants and headed to a path in the park to wait for someone. He attacked Kunik from behind and when Kunik began to counterattack, Lagimodiere fell onto the jetty. When Kunik also fell onto the boardwalk, Lagimodiere repeatedly stabbed him until the victim stopped breathing.

“In my opinion, it is clear from his conduct before, during and after the murder that Mr. Lagimodiere’s mental disorder at the time of the crime did not deprive him of his ability to know that members of society would consider his act of killing someone was wrong, “said the judge.

The sentence will be made at a later date.

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