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For the second time in his life a first-degree murder case against an Ottawa man has collapsed before he ever got to trial because of problems in the management of the prosecution against him.
Defence lawyers in a trial about an alleged drive-by bounty killing targeting three brothers in 2021, which killed two of them, have successfully argued that the right to a trial in a timely fashion has been violated.
After the ruling Friday by Superior Court Justice Ian Carter, Ahmed Siyad of Toronto walked out of the Ottawa Courthouse. Co-accused Abdullahi “Avon” Osman — the man who has now dodged two first-degree murder trials — remained in custody because of an outstanding warrant.
“When the [trial] delay exceeds the presumptive ceiling and the Crown has failed to establish an exceptional circumstance, the court has no option,” the judge told court Friday.
“It is most unfortunate that this double homicide and attempt murder case will not be tried on its merits. The law is clear, however…. A stay of proceedings is the only remedy that can be granted.”
Superior Court Justice Ian Carter — seen here in 2019 outside the Ottawa Courthouse before his appointment to the bench — told court Friday it’s ‘most unfortunate’ that the case can’t proceed, but the law is clear. (Justin Tang/The Canadian Press)
The right to a trial in a reasonable time is colloquially known in Canada as the Jordan principle, in honour of the case that helped establish appropriate timelines to get to trial. At the courthouse, it goes by 11(b).
Staying a charge stops or holds the legal process either temporarily or permanently.
Osman and Siyad were originally scheduled to stand trial starting in June last year, at which time the case was already in jeopardy of being tossed due to delay. Then, shortly before the trial began, the defence requested disclosure of data pulled from two phones — data that had not previously been handed over.
The June trial had to be cancelled and new dates were set starting in March this year, prompting defence counsel to ask for the stay of proceedings because of undue delay.
Non-disclosure protected victims’ privacy: police
The lead investigator in the case, Ottawa police Sgt. Chris O’Brien, told CBC News outside court Friday that the two phones in question belonged to the deceased victims.
“[The data from the phones was] gone over by analysts with the Ottawa Police Service with a fine-toothed comb, and no information that we believed had any relevance to this investigation was found on those devices. As such, they weren’t disclosed specifically to protect the privacy interests of the victims and third parties that they might have been communicating with, who had absolutely nothing to do with this crime,” O’Brien said.
“And so, it’s upsetting that two people are walking away from first-degree murder accusations for that reason.”
O’Brien added it’s his belief that defence counsel purposely waited until the trial was about to start in June to ask for the disclosure. “Had that been raised earlier, perhaps this issue could have been litigated and addressed earlier in the process, and we wouldn’t be where we are today.”
Lead investigator Sgt. Chris O’Brien of the Ottawa police homicide unit says he and his team are ‘very upset’ with Friday’s ruling, and that holding back data retrieved from the phones of the victims was done to protect their privacy. He also said police went through the data with a ‘fine-toothed comb’ but did not find anything pertinent to the case. (Francis Ferland/CBC)A shooting in broad daylight
Osman and Siyad were each charged with two counts of first-degree murder and one of attempted murder in what CBC News exclusively reported were the targeted bounty killings of Abdulaziz Abdullah, 34, and Mohamad Abdullah, 27, in the early evening of May 28, 2021.
The Abdullah brothers were shot at a busy Alta Vista Drive strip mall parking lot in broad daylight. A third brother was also shot and survived.
Sources told CBC News at the time that the brothers had bounties on their heads following a hefty robbery of drugs and money in the Dominican Republic.
Investigators alleged Osman helped plan the shooting and that hired hands Siyad and Mohamed Shire, also from Toronto, carried it out. Shire remains wanted and at large.
Osman charged last decade
Osman was earlier accused of first-degree murder in the shooting death of 27-year-old Yusuf Ibrahim in 2015.
But a year later, the Crown stood up in court and asked for the charges against Osman and his co-accused Mohamed Abdi Abdullahi to be withdrawn.
The Ottawa Citizen reported at the time that the improper handling of a witness had prompted the chief of police to call for an investigation.
“Based on the Crown’s ongoing assessment of the case, which included a careful and thorough review of the evidence and the applicable law, the Crown concluded that it was no longer viable to continue the prosecution and requested that the charges be withdrawn,” a spokesperson for the Ministry of the Attorney General told CBC in 2016.
On Friday, Osman and Siyad sat quietly in the prisoner’s box as the judge was reading his decision, sometimes nodding their heads in agreement.
Osman was represented by Leora Shemesh, while Siyad was represented by Cydney Israel and Julianna Schiller.
The assistant Crown prosecutors on the file were James Cavanagh and Anne Fitzpatrick.