News accounts of a tragic shooting in La Loche, Saskatchewan, Canada

1. a Loche IN THE APPEAL FOR A LIGHTER SENTENCE "...Two
doctors,... sent a letter to the court confirming their diagnosis that
the teenager in fact had fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, or
FASD,... Virtually everyone exposed to alcohol in utero has some
brain dysfunction, including difficulty understanding abstract
concepts, inability to predict outcomes, inability to see another
person’s perspective and what’s called “dysmaturity,”..."
12 Apr 2019
The London Free Press
IN THE APPEAL FOR A LIGHTER SENTENCE FOR THE BOY
WHO SHOT UP HIS SCHOOL AND KILLED FOUR IN LA
LOCHE, SASK., ONE THING IS CLEAR: TO SOME DEGREE, HE
WAS DOOMED FROM THE GET-GO.
CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD
National Post cblatchford@postmedia.com
Doomed, long before he held the gun
Little help, even less hope, in remote La Loche
From page NP1
Aside from the glaring tragedy — four lives taken, others left with
permanent serious injuries, the wider trauma done to any small
place by a school shooting — what’s striking about the La Loche,
Sask., case that was Thursday argued at the Saskatchewan Court
of Appeal is how hideously normal is the level of dysfunction in
the remote Dene community in northwest Saskatchewan, and how
bloody scarce the resources to do anything about it.
On Jan. 22, 2016, a young man just two weeks shy of his 18th
birthday shot and killed two cousins — one 13, one 17 — in their
home while they were all on their lunch break from school, then
took his aunt’s truck, returned to the school, where he shot seven
others, two of them, teacher Adam Wood and teacher’s assistant

2. Marie Janvier, fatally.
The teen, who can’t be identified because of a mandatory
publication ban under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, was
sentenced last year as an adult, which means he was given life
imprisonment with no parole for 10 years.
By comparison, a youth sentence would mean a maximum of six
years in custody, followed by a supervision order for another four
years.
His lawyer, Aaron Fox, is appealing the sentence, arguing that
trial Judge Janet McIvor was overwhelmed by the horror of what
happened and “lost sight” of what would actually help the teen
and that he did have the requisite “diminished moral
blameworthiness” that the young are presumed in law to have.
The young man, now 20, had been identified as needing a lot of
help from Grade 1 on and psycho-assessments done in grades 3
and 6 found him hyperactive and well below average.
That last one, which found him at a Grade 3 reading level and
Grade 2 in math, this when he was 12, recommended special
education and occupational therapy. There’s no evidence anything
of the sort happened.
To some degree, he was doomed from the get-go.
His biological mother frequently drank alcohol in large quantities
while she was pregnant with him.
This was belatedly confirmed by interviews with family members
in the preparation of what’s called a Gladue report, a sort of pre-
sentencing report for Aboriginal offenders.

3. Two doctors, who testified at the trial, later sent a letter to the
court confirming their diagnosis that the teenager in fact had fetal
alcohol spectrum disorder, or FASD, the term used to describe the
range of effects that can occur in someone whose mother drank
during pregnancy.
Virtually everyone exposed to alcohol in utero has some brain
dysfunction, including difficulty understanding abstract concepts,
inability to predict outcomes, inability to see another person’s
perspective and what’s called “dysmaturity,” which refers to the
failure of FASD individuals to meet society’s age-based social and
academic expectations.
RDF, as he is identified in McIvor’s decision, had all that going on
and more.
Because his mother couldn’t care for him, he was raised by his
aunt.. She, another aunt and his grandparents seem to have been
a supportive but enabling presence in his life: The grandparents
rarely said no to him; one aunt gave him her truck whenever he
wanted it, despite the fact he didn’t have a driver’s licence, and
occasionally even drove him to his dealer’s.
“I just drove him there and gave him money to go in and get it,”
she told the Gladue report author. “Everybody smokes weed here.
It’s just a common thing.”
At school, the boy was doing miserably. At the time of the
shooting, he was in Grade 10 for the third time. His attendance —
over 50 per cent — was somehow considered “good,” even though
he was often either late or missed classes once he got to school.
He found schoolwork confusing. His adoptive mother wasn’t
aware of any concerns and “wasn’t sure what he did there.” As he
told one of the doctors, what he mostly did was pace the halls. He

4. played video games.
He had a cruel nickname, which referred to an aspect of his looks;
he denied it was hurtful. Despite rumours he’d been bullied, he
denied that too. He was happy with his life, he said, if anyone
asked. He claimed he had lots of friends.
In October of 2016, just nine months after the shooting, he
pleaded guilty. He was willing, Fox says, “to talk to anybody who
would talk to him,” to get help.
For two years, he sat in custody. He got no help.
He’s in maximum security at a federal institution now. He has
received no counselling.
“I practise in Regina, my kids went to school here,” Aaron Fox
said Thursday after court, in a phone interview.
“If my kids were going to school and having the problems he had
… the resources that would have been available … they didn’t have
it there (in La Loche).”
The boy’s homeroom teacher, who really liked him and wanted
him to pass just one course, so he’d get a taste of success, said, “he
was just one of those kids and there was no help. They don’t have
the services.”
It was an absolutely horrific case.
For reasons none of the doctors understand, or the young man
himself, he has “impaired remorse and empathy.” As his older
cousin lay dying, begging “Don’t shoot me,” RDF shot him again
in the head. At a youth facility, as the one-year anniversary of the
shooting approached, he asked his worker, “You buying me a gift

5. for the anniversary?”
As Fox said, “He wasn’t the only one (in La Loche), but this was a
kid who did have special problems that were identified in Grade 1
and nothing was done.”
To add to the already awful toll then, one more.
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IN THE APPEAL FOR A LIGHTER SENTENCE FOR THE BOY
WHO SHOT UP HIS SCHOOL AND KILLED FOUR IN LA
LOCHE, SASK., ONE THING IS CLEAR: TO SOME DEGREE, HE
WAS DOOMED FROM T GET-GO.
Doomed, long before he held the gun. Aside from the glaring
tragedy — four lives taken, others left with permanent serious
injuries, the wider trauma done to any sm...
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Posted by: Elspeth Ross <rosse@ncf.ca>