Allan Schoenborn annual hearing scheduled May 24

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – A BC man who was found not criminally responsible after killing his three children in Merritt in 2008 will have another chance to request day passes next month, following previous agreements to delay the hearing.

Allan Schoenborn’s annual hearing is scheduled for May 24. The BC Review Board sets mandatory hearings for all inmates. Last July, Schoenborn consented to delaying his hearing while BC Crown lawyers seek to have him designated a “high-risk” accused, tightening his restrictions for confinement.

The designation hearing is still ongoing.

Dave Texeira speaks for the family of the victims and says he is concerned that if Schoenborn asks for absences from the facility, it will be breaking a promise he and his lawyers made to wait until a high risk designation hearing is over.

“Should the review board grant him freedoms before he’s found high risk, it stops the high risk designation hearing,” Texeira says. “This is why it is so frustrating that the defence has delay after delay.”

Schoenborn has been housed at the Forensic Psychiatric Hospital in Coquitlam since he was found not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder in February 2010 after stabbing his 10-year-old daughter and smothering his eight- and five-year-old sons at their home in their Merritt, BC.

Schoenborn was successful in getting supervised day passes in 2015 and a court proceeding in May heard his treatment team was planning to oppose that privilege this time.

Last July, the Criminal Justice Branch said the hospital would not facilitate any supervised outings in the time before Schoenborn’s next BC Review Board hearing.

However, whether Schoenborn will ask for passes won’t be known until the hearing.

“The positions are put forward at the actual hearing based on evidence that becomes available before the actual hearing,” Community Legal Assistance Society lawyer Diane Nielsen says.

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