Nunavut teen planned robbery that led to killing of Igloolik mom: Crown

Tracy Uttak, 26, died Nov. 29, 2012 in Igloolik. (FILE PHOTO)

The young Igloolik man who violently stabbed Tracy Uttak to death in her Igloolik home in 2012 may have suffered from a mental disorder at the time, but that disorder did not prevent him from planning an armed robbery of Uttak’s home.

And Uttak’s death on Nov. 29, 2012 resulted from that armed robbery turning horrifically violent.

That’s the theory which Crown prosecutor Barry McLaren presented to Justice Andrew Mahar in an Iqaluit courtroom April 10.

McLaren spoke a day after the young man’s defence lawyer, Shayne Kert, argued April 9 her client should not be held criminally responsible for Uttak’s death.

Kert argued April 9 that her client, now 19 — but protected under the Youth Criminal Justice Act because he was 16 at the time of the stabbing — likely suffers from schizophrenia and followed the violent commands of voices in his head.

But during his final arguments April 10, McLaren told Mahar an alternate theory.

Multiple witnesses at the three-week murder trial testified that the accused planned on “mugging” Uttak and “punching her in the face” in order to steal marijuana and cash he knew to be in her home, McLaren said.

“On Nov. 29 [the accused] did exactly what he said he would do,” said McLaren.

After arriving at Uttak’s home at about 6 p.m. that night, the accused decided to kill the young mother of four, whose children were in the home at the time.

The accused made that decision either before he came to the house or while he stabbed Uttak 27 times in the torso, face and neck, McLaren argued.

McLaren supported his theory by talking about bloody shoe prints found in Uttak’s house by the blood-spatter expert who testified during the trial; Uttak’s body was found barefoot.

A “considerable blood-letting” occurred in the kitchen, with footprints leading first towards the front door — where Uttak’s body was found — and then towards the back door, through which the accused fled, McLaren said.

The footprints suggest the accused began stabbing Uttak in the kitchen, then followed her to the front door, McLaren argued.

Once Uttak was dead, McLaren said the accused went towards the backdoor where he knew he could find marijuana. A bloody foot print to the left of the back door and blood on a nearby lamp show that the accused searched for drugs, McLaren added.

After fleeing the house, the accused ditched the knife, threw his blood-covered jacket in a garbage can, and — according to one witness — tried to blame somebody else for Uttak’s death, McLaren said.

All of this proves that the accused was not acting on the commands of voices hallucinated in his head but that he rationalized a plan to rob Uttak and then to discard the evidence, McLaren argued.

And the defence’s case — that the accused not be held criminally responsible because the 16-year-old couldn’t tell right from wrong as a result of his mental illness — fails because it does not explain why Uttak was the victim, McLaren said.

McLaren pointed out that although the accused told numerous medical professionals before and after Uttak’s death that he heard voices telling him to kill and harm people, the young man never said the voices told him to kill Uttak in particular.

But Kert, replying after McLaren’s final argument April 10, reminded Mahar that — according to the testimony of the accused’s psychiatrist — command hallucinations can happen at any time and can focus on whomever is present at the time.

And the bloody footprints following Uttak to the front of the house prove that her client was satisfying the commands in his head, stabbing Uttak “more than was necessary” to ensure she was dead, Kert argued in her client’s defence.

There was also no weed or money stolen from Uttak’s house, Kert said, suggesting that the Crown’s theory was less probable than her own.

Mahar adjourned court around 12:30 p.m. without setting a date for his written decision — which is likely to be released in court.

“This is going to take a significant amount of thought on my part,” Mahar said.

The accused appeared restless and bored throughout much of his last two days in court. He often leafed through a thick textbook of the Criminal Code of Canada — but backwards. And for one 20-minute interval April 10 he stared blankly at the computer screen of the lawyer sitting beside him.