Court upholds prison term for man who stabbed RCMP officer in the eye

Police tape seals off a downtown Kelowna, B.C., street corner on Aug. 14, 2011. (Chris Stanford/THE CANADIAN PRESS)

British Columbia’s highest court has upheld a prison sentence for a man who stabbed a Kelowna police officer in the eye, ruling that his significant mental health issues did not justify a shorter sentence for the unprovoked attack.

Richard Brant McCrae was acquitted of attempted murder and possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose in the March 2022 assault outside a supportive housing facility.

The trial judge instead convicted McCrae of aggravated assault of a police officer and obstructing a police officer, sentencing him to six years in prison. He was also convicted of disarming a police officer and received an additional sentence of one year in prison.

The Crown had sought an eight-year prison sentence in the case, while the defence argued McCrae should be released on probation given the time he had already served in custody while awaiting trial.

A psychiatric assessment presented to the court found McCrae had suffered from schizophrenia for many years and had used cannabis and methamphetamines at various times, including on the day of the attack.

The court heard that McCrae was living at the Ellis Place housing facility when he got into an argument with a staff member.

A Kelowna RCMP officer, Const. Jason Tymofichuk, responded to the facility and had a brief and “polite” exchange with McCrae, according to a summary of the events heard Tuesday by the B.C. Court of Appeal.

But the encounter quickly turned violent.

McCrae kicked and punched Tymofichuk and then stabbed him in the eye with a knife. The officer drew his gun and fired a shot before the two men wrestled for the firearm.

McCrae then cut himself with the knife and walked away before Mounties caught up with him and he was arrested.

The injured officer underwent two surgeries and suffered permanent nerve damage, facial numbness, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and anxiety, the court heard.

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At trial, McCrae argued he was not criminally responsible for the offences due to a mental disorder.

The trial judge accepted that McCrae suffered from schizophrenia and other mental health conditions but found he had not proven that he was incapable of understanding his actions or knowing they were wrong at the time of the attack.

The trial judge did find, however, that McCrae’s behaviour did not constitute attempted murder. “Although his actions could have caused Const. Tymofichuk’s death, he lacked a specific intention to kill,” Appeal Court Justice Nitya Iyer wrote in her summary of the lower court’s decision.

“Similarly, he acquitted on the charge of possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose finding Mr. McCrae had the knife in his pocket because he was a woodcarver and did not intend to use it to harm anyone before he used it to stab Const. Tymofichuk.”

McCrae appealed his six-year sentence to the high court, arguing the judge gave insufficient weight to the impact of his mental illness on his moral blameworthiness.

He argued that a sentence equivalent to the four-and-a-half years he had already spent in custody, plus probation, would have been appropriate.

The Appeal Court disagreed, finding the sentencing judge properly recognized McCrae’s schizophrenia and related disorders as significant mitigating factors that reduced his moral culpability.

The court also rejected McCrae’s argument that the lower court judge relied too heavily on comparable cases involving non-police victims.

The decision noted that while crimes against police officers generally warrant harsher penalties, judges may still look to factually similar cases involving civilian victims when assessing an appropriate sentence.

The three-judge Appeal Court unanimously dismissed McCrae’s appeal.

“In my view, the appellant has not established that sentence is demonstrably unfit,” Iyer concluded, leaving McCrae’s sentence unchanged.