A 14-year-old girl was sentenced for her role in several violent incidents in Nanaimo since November 2022. (File Photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By Ian Holmes

young offender

‘There are too many of these cases:’ Nanaimo teen sentenced for multiple violent attacks

Jul 3, 2024 | 5:34 AM

NANAIMO — Embroiled in a nasty longstanding feud with former friends, a Nanaimo girl pleaded guilty to several crimes, including for a trio of assaults.

The 14-year-old unnamed youth was sentenced after she pleaded guilty to three counts of assault and a mischief charge in connection to offences over the last year-and-a-half in Nanaimo.

On Nov. 19, 2022 the youth, joined by two other girls, punched a 12-year-old female victim several times and then pushed her into a duck pond at a north Nanaimo apartment complex.

The three aggressors wouldn’t let the victim out of the water, with an adult intervening and walking her home, the Crown’s Kaitlyn Tourangeau told a sentencing hearing last week in provincial court in Nanaimo.

An hour from midnight on Aug. 21, 2023 the offender and another girl launched a landscaping brick through the front window of another girl’s home, which court was told was also an act of bullying.

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The two girls unloaded bear spray toward the home, but were arrested soon after and found to be intoxicated, Tourangeau noted.

An agreed statement of facts outlined violent altercations at a Nanaimo fast food restaurant and Woodgrove Centre in December 2023 and January 2024 respectively, in which a third victim was assaulted on both occasions, including being punched, then kicked several times.

“There’s a fairly high level of violence before you your honour today on these files, as well as the sheer number of files — it essentially paints a picture of a fairly long-standing violent trend…”

Court was told the offender has a history of childhood trauma, substance abuse and mental health challenges.

Her actions were described as a “Mean Girls” situation which escalated out of control, said defence counsel Kathleen Kerr-Donohue.

While acknowledging the actions were wrong, Kerr-Donohue told court her client “couldn’t take it anymore”, saying her client was on the receiving end of an ongoing harassment campaign involving cruel gossip and rumours from multiple girls.

Kerr-Donohue’s client has undergone and continues to participate in several community support programs to address her mental health and substance abuse issues.

“I do think that she’s been making some considerable strides in trying to understand her triggers and to better understand how one should deal with conflict.”

Saying there’s no place in society for this type of behaviour, judge Brian Harvey said the offender is lucky her victims avoided serious injuries.

“Some of these might be classified as swarming or bullying type cases, it’s unfortunate that there are too many of these cases that these courts have to deal with in this province day in, day out,” he said, telling court he was pleased to hear the girl’s life has stabilized in recent months.

He warned her about turning her behaviour around since being convicted of similar crimes as an adult involves entirely different and more severe sentencing principles.

Judge Harvey accepted a joint sentence recommendation of a year-long Intensive Support Supervision Order, meaning the girl will be under the watch of a youth probation officer and a youth worker.

The sentence includes counselling provisions, no-contact orders and a weapons ban, including incapacitating spray devices.

The girl had no prior criminal record.

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Ian.holmes@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @reporterholmes