A man who mistakenly killed a woman while wanting to kill his estranged girlfriend has been found guilty of second-degree murder in Canada.
The Court of Queen's Bench decision was handed down on Thursday in the deadly shooting of 30-year-old Nicole Leanne Cooney in Edmonton's Inglewood neighbourhood.
Prosecutor Aleisha Bartier told the court that Lenny Lavallee shot Nicole while intending to kill Theresa Butler, her friend, and his girlfriend.
Lenny Lavallee
According to him, during Lavallee and Butler’s three-month relationship, he often became jealous of other people in Butler’s life, and threatened to kill her and her dog on multiple occasions.
Before Cooney was shot, Butler was hiding from Lavallee at his mother’s house and trying to make plans to leave the city, Bartier said.
On the night of April 17, 2016, Butler went out to walk her dog and ran into Cooney, who joined her.
Butler, who testified during the trial, said she heard Lavallee shout at her, and when she turned, she saw him standing behind Cooney.
“She yelled at Nicole to run, but it was too late. Nicole was shot through the heart and the lung,” Bartier said.
As nearby residents rushed to help Cooney, Lavallee fled to an acquaintance’s nearby home and hid in the attic, remaining there for five hours while a police tactical unit tried to convince him to come out.
Nicole
Bartier acknowledged she and fellow prosecutor Mark Van Manen’s case is circumstantial, but said the evidence taken all together makes it clear he took steps to carry out the shooting, only getting his intended victim wrong.
“The evidence of planning and deliberation is unavoidable,” Bartier said.
A woman who tried to help the victim at the scene testified in court and said she overheard a man say he had shot the wrong person.
"He came up to the front of the house, he was just looking," Shanlai Cook said. "He just said, 'I shot the wrong one.' "
A date for sentencing has yet to be set.
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