Young Nunavut man guilty of manslaughter in 2010 Rankin Inlet stabbing

Colin Makpah, then 29, leaves the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit in April, 2014. (FILE PHOTO)

Nunavut Justice Neil Sharkey has found a 30-year-old Rankin Inlet man, Colin Makpah, guilty of manslaughter in the 2010 stabbing death of Donald James (DJ) Gamble.

At the Nunavut Court of Justice in Iqaluit April 21, Sharkey spent the afternoon reading his 32-page decision to a packed Iqaluit courtroom as Makpah, who had been out on bail, sat quietly beside his parents in the court gallery.

Family members of DJ Gamble sat on the opposite side of the gallery, some sobbing and hugging each other as Sharkey pronounced Makpah guilty.

“This was a tragic death that never should’ve happened, but of course it did,” Sharkey said.

“And it did because Colin Makpah, in my view, went way over the top.”

During a three-week judge-alone trial, which wrapped up last May, Makpah’s defence lawyer, Shayne Kert, failed in her bid to prove her client acted in self-defence when he stabbed Gamble four times in the torso with a filet knife on Aug. 14, 2010.

Kert argued that Gamble left Makpah with no choice when he pinned Makpah to the ground after a small, drunken party that got out of hand.

Moments before he pinned Makpah, Gamble, highly intoxicated, had become enraged and slapped his common-law partner in the face with a magazine.

He then turned on Makpah and another friend when they tried to intervene, according to testimony at the trial, Sharkey said.

Sharkey accepted Makpah’s testimony that, in order to scare Gamble into stopping his aggression, Makpah announced he was going to get a knife.

But in his decision Sharkey agreed with Crown prosecutor Faiyaz Amir Alibhai who argued that, until Makpah introduced a knife into the situation, DJ’s violence was on the “minor end of the scale.”

“Only Colin used and threatened to use a weapon — a knife. DJ did not at any time resort to, or threaten to use, a knife,” Sharkey found.

“The use of a knife in response to what was a minimal use of force by DJ was grossly disproportionate.”

This case hinged on whether Makpah’s actions were reasonable and proportional under the circumstances, Sharkey said.

While at the time of the stabbing Makpah had reason to believe Gamble would continue being violent, Sharkey found no reason, “from an objective standpoint” for Makpah’s belief that Gamble would seriously injure others.

And at the crucial moment when Makpah stabbed Gamble, Sharkey found Makpah had a momentary advantage when he could have resorted to other means of deterring Gamble.

“Instead, Colin used a clear and momentary advantage to stab DJ,” Sharkey said.

In coming to his decision, Sharkey pointed to a key inconsistency in Makpah’s testimony cited by the Crown.

On the one hand, Makpah said throughout his testimony, especially when his memory failed him, that “it was all happening so fast,” Sharkey said.

But on the other hand, Makpah testified that he only stabbed Gamble enough to stop him from attacking others, not hard enough to kill him.

Sharkey said he found it “incredible” that things were moving too fast to consider some obvious things, while not too fast to carefully use less than full force in stabbing Gamble.

“Colin’s testimony… is at best, sadly, a sound from a bell of false hope with no ring of truth,” Sharkey said.

After Sharkey finished reading his decision, Makpah and his parents sat still, their eyes focused on the judge.

When Sharkey then adjourned for a short recess, Makpah left the courtroom while his parents stood talking in soft voices to defence lawyer Kert.

Makpah remains out on bail under an agreement between defence and Crown lawyers until his sentencing hearing.

Sharkey has not set a date for that hearing, but said that, once it’s completed, he would only take a few days to issue his sentencing judgment.

Manslaughter is an unlawful killing without an intent to cause death. The offence carries no minimum penalty — except for four-year mandatory minimum that applies only when a firearm is used — and a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.