Trial of accused spouse-killer continues at Nunavut court

Adrian Van Eindhoven is escorted in handcuffs from the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit to a police vehicle. His trial continues Oct. 7. (PHOTO BY DAVID MURPHY)

An eight-man, five-woman jury saw graphic photographs and hours of video interrogation footage during the first week of a trial in Iqaluit for a Rankin Inlet man accused of second-degree murder.

Adrian VanEindhoven faces the murder charge in connection with the 2004 death of 22-year-old Leanne Irkotee.

Irkotee — VanEindhoven’s common-law spouse — died of a chest wound from a steak knife in the early morning of April 23, 2004.

Last week, Crown prosecutor Nick Devlin called the RCMP member who arrested VanEindhoven and put him into custody April 23 as well as the doctor who tried to resuscitate Irkotee at Rankin Inlet’s medical centre.

Cst. Alex Lyon told jurors that when he arrived at VanEindhoven’s house, and was directed upstairs to a bedroom, he saw Irkotee lying with her head on a pillow, still alive.

VanEindhoven was slumped over Irkotee, crying, and pleading with Lyon to help her, Lyon said.

Lyon also said VanEindhoven told him Irkotee tried to stab him.

Lyon said VanEindhoven immediately told his side of the story when asked about how the incident happened.

VanEindhoven told Lyon he had been asleep when Irkotee tried to stab him with a black-handled steak knife. Van Eindhoven said he stopped the attack with his hands.

That scuffle left a “scratch” on VanEindhoven, said Lyon. But the mark has also been described in evidence as a “puncture wound” and a “laceration.”

VanEindhoven then told Lyon that Irkotee fell on the knife after the attack.

Lyon said he examined Irkotee — who he noted as seeming intoxicated — and noticed several bruises on her face.

After brief questioning, Lyon said VanEindhoven told him that he had gotten into a fight with Irkotee the previous night, and that he had struck her in the face.

Then, after paramedics rushed Irkotee to the health centre, Lyon arrested VanEindhoven for assault.

Lyon took VanEindhoven to the RCMP detachment in Rankin Inlet, then went to the health centre to check on Irkotee’s status — but by then she had died.

VanEindhoven’s reaction to the news was “extreme,” Lyon said. He said Van Eindhoven started screaming and banged his head against the cell wall three or four times.

After refusing to talk to a lawyer, VanEindhoven called his sister from a room where he sat by himself.

While VanEindhoven was in the room, Lyon and detachment clerk Wendy St. Germaine, overheard Van Eindhoven yelling and crying.

Lyon said he heard Van Eindhoven say, “I killed her. I fucked up,” which he noted in his notebook.

St. Germaine, who also appeared as a witness, told jurors via videoconference that she heard Van Eindhoven say, “my baby’s dead, I’ve killed her.”

Defence lawyer Laura Stevens pointed to evidence taken from an RCMP sergeant who investigated the case, quoting VanEindhoven as saying “she said she’d stab me. My baby is dead.”

RCMP members interrogated VanEindhoven four hours after the phone call, using a video camera The jury watched footage and heard audio from it over a span of two days.

Throughout hours of interrogation, VanEindhoven did not admit to stabbing Irkotee.

Miles Schuman, a doctor who worked in Rankin Inlet at the time, described the state of Irkotee’s body, using photos of her corpse.

Schuman said he and two other doctors, along with six nurses, gave Irkotee “all the blood we had” in the medical centre.

After she died, Schuman said he saw bruises on “multiple areas of her body” and described an egg-sized area at the back of her head as being “soft.”

VanEindhoven sat in court over the course of the three days wearing the same black-striped shirt, often slouching with one hand to his head.

His trial continues Oct. 7 at the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit.