The Yukon’s highest court has set aside the appeal launched by a British Columbia man found guilty of first-degree murder for the 2017 killing of 25-year-old Adam Cormack in a gravel pit off the Alaska Highway.
Edward James Penner of Quesnel, B.C., was found guilty of shooting Cormack in the head in a September 2019 trial by jury. The court heard that he shot and killed Cormack in a planned and deliberate fashion. Penner, who was 22 years old at the time of the trial, was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years on the same day the jury delivered its verdict.
Roughly a month after his conviction, Penner filed an appeal.
A three-judge panel representing the Yukon Court of Appeal published a decision regarding that appeal on May 25. The appeal was set aside with the judges citing Penner’s refusal of assistance from provided lawyers and unwillingness to reliably participate in court hearings over the more than three years since the filing of his appeal.
A written decision from the court of appeal outlines the history of proceedings leading up to the decision. The appeal was first filed in October 2019. Following the launch of the appeal, the Yukon Legal Services Society, which provides legal aid in the territory, agreed to fund it and assigned him a lawyer. The court’s decision states that Penner fired this lawyer before the written argument he had prepared could be filed with the court.
Penner refused to participate in a spring 2022 conference about the case. Despite this, the appeal was not dismissed, and at a later case management conference, Penner appeared by video and informed the court that he was in the process of retaining his own lawyer and did not want the legal aid services he was offered.
When a case management conference was set for a month later, in late April 2022, Penner again refused to appear, and he was notified that the court would move to dismiss the appeal. He also missed a mid-May 2022 court appearance, but the court determined that it was still premature to dismiss. Instead, the court ordered the appointment of a lawyer who was not party to the lawsuit to analyze the case and see if the appeal had merit.
This task went to David McWhinnie, who turned his report in to the court on March 3, 2023, identifying three potential grounds an appeal might succeed based on.
McWhinnie’s report and a letter outlining the court’s next steps were sent to the prison where Penner is incarcerated, but a corrections officer advised the court registry that Penner refused to view the documents.
Penner refused to appear once more at a May 10, 2023 hearing, prompting crown counsel Noel Sinclair to ask that the appeal be dismissed based on the appellant’s apparent lack of interest.
“Approximately three and one-half years have now passed since Mr. Penner filed his notice of appeal. His persistent refusal to accept the assistance that has been made available to him has brought the matter to a standstill,” the conclusion of the court of appeal’s decision reads.
“In light of what has transpired, we are satisfied there is no realistic possibility he will take steps in the future to prosecute his appeal. Accordingly, it is time to bring that appeal to an end by dismissing it for want of prosecution.”
The decision includes a final comment noting that the dismissal did not engage the merits of the appeal and does not bar Penner from reopening it.
Contact Jim Elliot at jim.elliot@yukon-news.com
