A man recently convicted of murder was thrown out of court this week.
During a sentencing hearing Thursday morning, Dean Boucher was taken out of the courtroom after refusing to stop interrupting presiding Supreme Court Justice Leigh Gower.
“There’s nothing left you can do to me,” Boucher kept repeating.
“You have nothing, nothing.”
Flanked by two plainclothes police officers, Boucher stood and walked out when Gower asked them to remove him.
Better known to many as Dean Johns, Boucher came to court dressed in jail scrubs, for the first time since the trial began.
While he almost always held an eagle feather during the four-week trial, he sat empty-handed in court Thursday.
Along with co-accused, Mark Lange, Boucher was convicted of second-degree murder last Friday.
After about two days of deliberations, the eight women and four men of the jury came back with a guilty verdict for both men in the beating death of Carcross hotelier Robert Olson.
Olson was 64 years old when he died, on a cold December night, just before Christmas 2004. After being severely beaten around the head, while he lay on the floor of the Caribou Hotel’s saloon, Boucher and Lange loaded the dying man’s body into the back of his own truck and drove towards Whitehorse.
Olson was dead by the time they pulled the black and red pickup off the road to check on him.
Boucher and Lange then dumped his remains in a snowy ditch in the Wolf Creek subdivision, south of Whitehorse.
The jury had no recommendations for how long Boucher should spend behind bars, eight jurors suggested Lange be eligible for parole after the minimum term of 10 years.
The Crown is seeking 15 years for both men.
Because they were convicted of murder, each man must serve a life sentence. This means at least 10 years in a federal penitentiary before applying for parole.
The maximum sentence is 25 years.
Since last Friday, Boucher has changed more than his clothing.
After the verdict came down, in the packed but silent courtroom, Boucher started making general comments to Lange and the lawyers.
“It’s only fair Mark,” he said, while the jury was out of the room.
Sometime later he called the lawyers clowns.
“Clowns, all of you, except you John,” he said addressing Crown prosecutor John Phelps.
During the intervening days something went wrong between Boucher and his lawyer, Keith Parkkari, who quit the case Tuesday morning.
Boucher has not sought a new lawyer and is now representing himself in court, despite Gower’s suggestion that he carefully consider that choice.
With a uniformed RCMP officer sitting beside him, Boucher spoke at the hearing.
He told the court he just wanted his punishment.
“(Phelps) figured I’d want to argue whose fault this is and I don’t want to anymore,” he said.
“I’ve been pointing fingers at people all my life and whatever the Crown wants, I’ll take it — today.”
And Boucher said he’s ready to reform.
“I need help and I want to get the fuck out of here, go down South, where I can get help.”
Pausing before he finished speaking, Boucher apologized to his people, the Carcross/Tagish First Nation.
“I’ll take the 15 years, I just want to get out of here,” he added.
But neither Boucher nor Lange were sentenced yesterday.
Andre Roothman, Lange’s defence lawyer, asked for a pre-sentence report before the judge decided how many years he should spend in the pen.
A pre-sentence report has nothing to do with the crime, said Gower.
It outlines the person’s life and the experiences that shaped them. Judges are expected look at the crime in context of the person’s life when handing down a sentence.
This report would likely be important in sentencing both men, said Phelps.
Stating it would be “of great benefit” to Boucher and Lange, Gower ordered the report, noting Boucher always has the right to remain silent if he doesn’t want one done.
On his way out of the courtroom, Boucher handed Phelps a blue folder.