A Saskatoon teen is admitting she planned and executed a fiery assault on a classmate at Evan Hardy Collegiate in September 2024.
The girl, now 16, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and assault causing bodily harm at Court of King’s Bench in Saskatoon on Monday.
She sat in the prisoner’s box wearing a zip-up hoodie and a Metallica t-shirt with a graphic of the band’s “Harvester of Sorrow” song.
The girl had been scheduled to stand trial in 2026. Neither she nor her victim can be identified under the federal Youth Criminal Justice Act.
A teenage girl has pleaded guilty to attempted murder for splashing a fellow student with a flammable liquid and setting her on fire in a hallway at Evan Hardy Collegiate last September. The 16-year-old also admitted causing bodily harm to a teacher who helped the victim.
The teen has been in custody since her arrest on Sept. 5, 2024 and is due back in court on Feb. 26 for sentencing submissions. The parents of the 15-year-old victim were in court for the pleas. Their daughter was not.
Crown prosecutor Ainsley Furlonger said the Crown is no longer requesting an adult sentence.
Outside court, a family member of the injured teen read a prepared statement written by her parents.
“The horror of what has happened will never disappear,” she said.
“Our daughter will always wear the evidence of these crimes.”
Furlonger read a 40-minute agreed statement of facts into the record before Justice Krista Zerr. It detailed what happened that day in the hallway at the east-side Saskatoon high school, and in the months leading up to the attack.
The parents of the injured teen, and the parents of her best friend, went to police and the school multiple times between June and August 2024 with concerns about escalating online threats from the other girl.
Court heard the victim had befriended the younger girl in Grade 9 but ended the relationship within a few months because of her constant texting. Once she indicated that she no longer wanted to be friends, the younger teen began threatening her and another friend.
The parents became involved at the start of the summer break in 2024, the injured girl’s mother said in a March 2025 interview with CBC.
“June 30 was the first time she brought this to my attention. She showed me her phone and said that she’s been getting these text messages from someone from Evan Hardy that she didn’t know very well,” she said.
“She kind of backed away and told them, ‘I hardly know you so we don’t have to talk every day.’ And politely asked her to step back. And she wouldn’t step back, so our daughter got her friend involved.”
The parents say they met with police and the principal of Evan Hardy in the last week of August 2024.
“We were very concerned about this person harassing our daughter and her friends and we wanted to make sure that they are kept separated. [The principal] assured us that they would have a plan in place.”
The chronology outlined in the agreed statement of facts showed teachers and school officials were well aware of the potential for violence.
They knew the younger teen had been admitted to hospital multiple times over the summer, and had attempted self-harm. Teachers suspected she had engaged in self-harm the morning of the assault. They were sending her home that day because of her troubling behaviour. She had also previously set a fire in the school library.
The statement of facts also shows school administrators simply failed to consider the potential worst-case scenario of one student lighting another on fire.
The attack, for instance, happened on the second day of school. The younger teen was subjected to a bag check and patted herself down for weapons before entry to the school on both the first and second days.
Although officials checked her bag, they did not inspect the contents of her sealed black metal water bottle. It was filled with gasoline.
Students built a memorial in front of the school after the attack. (Travis Reddaway/CBC)
During the investigation after the attack, police searched her school locker and opened her cellphone.
In the locker, they discovered a journal with entries such as “she will be dead,” written the day before the attack. On her phone were videos of the victim and her friend taken without their knowledge at school, as well as a video of a stuffed animal being stabbed with a paring knife, and photos of the younger teen with self-inflicted injuries.
After the attack, the girl told police “the voices told me to do it” and “that bitch deserved it.” She also told police that the male voices were giving her options on what to do, and “had been nagging her.”
In accepting the guilty pleas, Zerr confirmed with defence lawyers Fola Adelugba and Jonathan Stockdale that they were not disputing the girl’s fitness to stand trial, and were not claiming a mental disorder as a defence.
Furlonger said the Crown is seeking an Intensive Rehabilitative Custody and Supervision (IRCS) order, a specialized youth sentence under the Youth Criminal Justice Act for young people convicted of a serious violent offence.
To this end, she requested a psychological assessment and a pre-sentence report.
Outside court, the victim’s aunt said her family just wants no one else to experience what their family is going through.
“It is our hope that events like this never happen again and that children can feel safe,” she said.
“No matter where they may be.”