Crown cites \u0027irrefutable\u0027 evidence in Hikoalok trial closing arguments, defence makes case for manslaughter
The defence team, led by Michael Smith and Brook Laforest, made its closing arguments to the jury Thursday and said Hikoalok was “blackout” drunk from drinking alcohol on May 24, 2018, and could not have formed the intent to harm or kill Salm as she worked alone in the Christian Science Reading Room on Laurier Avenue that morning.Sign up to receive daily headline news from the Ottawa SUN, a division of Postmedia Network Inc.
“Tyler Hikoalok, in the state he was in as a result of alcohol consumption, but also as a result of a brain condition… he did not have the ability to form intent to kill Elisabeth Salm,” Smith told the jury Thursday. “And not only that, but he had no recollection of what transpired in that period of time. When you couple the alcohol and , you can only come to the conclusion that Tyler Hikoalok did not form the intent to bring harm to Elisabeth Salm.
“He sexually assaulted her in the course of this vicious attack, and the extreme violence to her face, head and neck incapacitated her. She was virtually unrecognizable as a result of the injuries,” Holowka said. Salm died the following day from traumatic brain injury. Hikoalok is seen on surveillance video wearing different clothes as he arrives 31 minutes later at his former school, the Debbie Campbell Learning Academy.
Hikoalok’s testimony is “replete with inconsistencies,” Holowka said, between the varying accounts he gave to police following his arrest, the account he gave to the psychiatrist and the one he gave to the court.“Those claims are undermined by everything in the evidence,” Holowka said. “They do not withstand scrutiny.”
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