Man sentenced for brutal assault
CALGARY - The prolonged attack by a man on his former girlfriend over a two-day period nearly two years ago was "terrorizing, nothing short of torture," a judge said Thursday in sentencing him to six years in prison. In handing down the penalty to Michael Brian Clark, 23, Court of Queen's Bench Justice Marsha Erb said the court takes an "exceedingly dim view" of domestic violence. Erb gave Clark double credit for nearly 19 months spent in custody, leaving him with about two years and eight months to serve. (Calgary Herald) PREVIOUS: Prosecutor details brutal attack, torture of woman
By Dave Dormer, Sun Media
CALGARY - Jennifer MacDonald went to court Friday expecting to see the ex-boyfriend who savagely attacked her sent to jail.
Instead, the 23-year-old sat helplessly, sobbing, as Justice Marsha Erb placed Michael Brian Clark, 23, on house arrest with strict conditions until his next sentencing hearing on Aug. 30 – the third such delay in sentencing since Clark was convicted in March of a cocaine-fueled assault on MacDonald in an apartment the pair shared.
“This isn’t happening,” cried MacDonald outside the courtroom while being consoled by her mother, Candi.
Clark was convicted of a number of charges, including aggravated assault for the November 2005 attack in which he choked MacDonald unconscious, threatened to kill her and pulled a plastic bag filled with bear spray over her head.
A portion of a court-ordered pre-sentence report by forensic psychiatrist Dr. George Duska was not completed until Friday morning – due to what Erb called systemic problems – leaving Clark’s defence team without sufficient time to challenge it.
Under Erb’s conditions, Clark is to live with his 81-year-old grandmother under a 24-hour curfew, abstain from drugs and alcohol with random testing and undergo counseling. Erb also placed a no-contact order on Clark, covering MacDonald and her family.
“He will not step off the property,” said Erb. “He is in jail, he is in jail at home, let’s be clear here.”
Outside the courtroom, Candi was overwhelmed with emotion.
“How can he be out?” she asked. “It’s wrong he’s going to be at home with an 81-year-old, how is she going to...” she said, her voice trailing off.
Crown prosecutor Janice Rae said she intends to seek a six- to eight-year prison sentence less time served, while defence lawyer John Hooker intends to ask the court for time served.
Clark spent 21 months in the Calgary Remand Centre during the trial and subsequent sentencing hearings.
dave.dormer@calgarysun.com
Daryl Slade, Calgary Herald
Published: Friday, March 16, 2007
Jennifer MacDonald gets a hug from her mother, Candi MacDonald, after Michael Clark was found guilty of abusing her.
Ted Rhodes, Calgary Herald
A sobbing, emotionally drained Jennifer MacDonald delivered a round of hugs outside court Thursday after her former boyfriend was convicted on eight of 10 criminal charges related to a 16-hour torture attack at their southwest condo.
High on the 23-year-old woman's list of people to thank were her mother Candi MacDonald, older sister Heather, Crown prosecutor Janice Rea, Calgary police Det. Hal Wetherup and her new boyfriend.
She politely declined public comment, but her mother was quick to point out the key was Court of Queen's Bench Justice Marsha Erb had recognized "the seriousness of the assaults" on Nov. 10 and 11, 2005.
"The fact we got her out (of the 10-month relationship) alive is the most important. We didn't think that was going to happen," said the mother.
"For the family, early on, my big concern was it would happen in a moment of anger towards her. We were concerned she would truly die before she got out of it."
Erb acquitted Michael Brian Clark, 23, of attempted murder and administering a noxious substance -- bear mace -- in connection with the lengthy assault.
But she found him guilty of everything else: aggravated assault, unlawful confinement, choking or strangling with intent, administering a noxious substance (motor oil), uttering threats of death or bodily harm, using an imitation firearm to commit an indictable offence and two counts of assault with a weapon (a knife and a pellet gun).
Defence lawyer John Hooker had argued his client should have been acquitted of all of the charges but the two counts of assault with a weapon causing bodily harm.
Hooker argued none of injuries were life-threatening. He declined to say anything outside court after the verdicts were read.
Heather MacDonald said the family is relieved. She said the verdict will enable everyone, in particular her sister, to "get on with the rest of our lives."
"We've been living with it the last 16 months, seeing Jenn fall apart even when the phone rang," she said. "But the truth was on our side."
Erb said the couple's stormy relationship, which began on New Year's Eve 2004, was fuelled by the offender's marijuana and cocaine addiction and his illicit drug dealing, and in the last couple of weeks by her drug use.
Clark was paranoid about what he perceived were her "lies" relating to prior relationships, and it only heightened after $35,000 was taken from the home in a break-in two months before the attack.
"He asked about former relationships and wanted answers. He needed to monitor her every waking moment," said the judge. "The relationship was fuelled by suspicion and mistrust."
The incident began with Clark's consistent badgering of his girlfriend over her alleged lies about former lovers, reading her e-mails, planting recording devices in her car and demanding to find out if she'd slept with a certain male friend.
When MacDonald dialled a female friend on the speaker phone to confirm the sex occurred before her relationship with Clark, he burned her arm with a cigarette and later on the nipple with a lighter.
He then gathered a laundry basket with a pellet gun, large kitchen knife, motor oil and bear mace and began to assault her.
He shot her twice in the neck and once in the forehead, the latter leaving a scar, poured the oil on her face and torso, sprayed bear mace in the room, cut off her ponytail with the knife and threatened to chop her "one at a time" with the knife.
After she went into the bathroom off the master bedroom, he went in and grabbed her by the throat and picked her up, choking her until she passed out.
Clark testified he couldn't remember doing so and only knew of the incident from police reports. But Erb agreed with Rea that when he told forensic psychologist Thomas Dalby she was gurgling after she passed out, it was information only the perpetrator could have known.
The judge said the incident only concluded when he told her to get out and poured filthy "bong water" on her.
She then drove to her family's home in Okotoks, where her mother called for an ambulance and alerted police.
Clark denied or minimized most of the incidents when he testified at trial.
Erb ordered presentence psychological, psychiatric and risk assessment reports for sentencing arguments. The case will be back in court next Friday to set a date for submissions by Rea and Hooker and to hear victim impact statements.
© The Calgary Herald 2007
Daryl Slade, Calgary Herald
Published: Wednesday, March 07, 2007
A 23-year-old Calgary woman testified on Tuesday that her boyfriend's paranoia over her previous relationships led to him to torturing and terrorizing her over a 16-hour period.
Jennifer MacDonald wept and shook in the witness stand as she recounted the ordeal that began Nov. 10, 2005, at their apartment on Palermo Way S.W., and concluded when she fled the following morning.
MacDonald told Crown prosecutor Janice Rea how a drug-addled Michael Brian Clark, also 23, forced her to take a potentially lethal dose of ecstacy because she had lied about whether or not she had had sex with other men before they met in January 2005.
"He said I played Russian roulette with his life, he could do the same with mine," said a sobbing MacDonald.
"He went into the kitchen and came back with a plate that had four lines of MDMA, each about two inches long. Two of them had a lethal dose, and I had to take two of them.
"It was only fair. I felt I'd played Russian roulette, it was only fair I'd do the same. I was convinced I was in the wrong -- emotionally and physically."
Clark is charged with attempted murder, aggravated assault, administering a noxious substance, unlawful confinement and seven other charges relating to the incident.
A month earlier, he had chopped off the heads of several dozen of her teddy bears.
MacDonald said Clark also burned cigarettes into her arm and nipple of her breast, shot her twice in the neck and once in the forehead with a pellet gun, repeatedly threatened her, sprayed bear spray into a plastic bag and put it over her head so she couldn't breathe, poured motor oil down her throat and chopped off her hair.
She said she once escaped out the back patio door, but he came out and dragged her back, and she was afraid to leave again.
Later, he held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her, she said.
"He said he'd been nice so far, and if I came clean, he'd stop. If not, he said he'd chop once for every lie. I told him I wasn't lying," she said.
She said that when she was on the bed, he brought in more drugs, which he also said were lethal, and told her to take them.
"If I didn't, he would put them down my throat anyway," she testified.
Later, he came into the bedroom, she recalled, and said, "I can't believe you're not . . . dead yet," then grabbed her by the throat and lifted her off the floor, causing her to pass out.
"He said, 'why don't you just . . . die?' said MacDonald. "It was almost an anger, despair, disbelief, that he couldn't believe I was still alive."
Under cross-examination by defence lawyer John Hooker, the complainant acknowledged Clark was addicted to drugs, and his drug use was noticeably increasing by August 2005. She said he had obsessive behaviour, particularly relating to her past relationships.
She also admitted she had been using drugs for 21/2 weeks before the ordeal, including daily for about a week.
The trial before Court of Queen's Bench Justice Marsha Erb continues today.
dslade@theherald.canwest.com
© The Calgary Herald 2007