Mid-day gunplay in a high density, inner-city Calgary neighborhood has landed a city man an eight-year prison term.
Justice Brian Stevenson on Wednesday agreed with Crown prosecutor Rose Greenwood that a severe sentence was warranted for Samuel Deverze to deter him and others from resorting to gun violence on city streets.
Stevenson noted firearms have become far too commonplace on Canadian streets and stiffer sentences are warranted to curb such behaviour.
“Mere possession of loaded firearms is inherently dangerous,” the Calgary Court of Justice said, quoting an Alberta Court of Appeal decision on such an offence.
“When such weapons are allowed in the community, death and serious injury are literally at hand, only an impulse and trigger pull away,” he said, citing the 2009 case.
“The problem is not unique to Alberta; it has become a nationwide phenomenon.”
Stevenson convicted Deverze last July 31, of five allegations, including discharging a firearm with intent to wound, maim, disfigure, or endanger the life of another person in connection with a March 22, 2020 incident. That offence carries a minimum punishment of five years where a restricted or prohibited firearm is used.
The judge dismissed arguments by defence counsel Andrea Urquhart that the mandatory minimum would be a sufficient punishment for Deverze, finding a harsher term was required to deter gun violence.
Deverze, then 29, was shot at by the passenger in a van in an alley between 15 and 17 Ave. S.W. that Sunday afternoon before returning fire at the two unknown occupants of the vehicle.
In convicting Deverze, Stevenson rejected suggestions by then-defence counsel Derek Jugnauth that the offender was acting in self-defence at the time of the shootout.
“This area of Calgary … is heavily populated with primarily apartment dwellers,” Stevenson said in convicting Deverze.
“As it was a Sunday, coupled with the pandemic, most people were home in their apartments, and multiple civilians heard and/or witnessed the shootout, primarily from apartment balconies and at least one eyewitness at street level in the alley.”
He also dismissed suggestions by Jugnauth the evidence didn’t support a finding Deverze intended to endanger the lives of the individuals he was shooting at.
“In my opinion the evidence shows that Deverze shot at the driver’s side door, knowing that there were individuals in both the driver’s seat and front passenger seat,” Stevenson said in his ruling last July.
“He did not point it at the ground, or into the air, or in any direction other than at the van.”
In agreeing Wednesday with Greenwood’s call for an eight-year term, the judge noted there were many aggravating factors in the case.
“He fired multiple rounds at the van,” Stevenson said.
“The shooting happened in a densely-populated area … and in the middle of the day.”
He also noted Canada ranks fifth internationally in gun deaths per capita.
“I fear that we are developing a gun culture like that that exists in many areas of our neighbour to the south,” he said, noting the U.S. ranks first in that dubious category.
“Carrying a loaded firearm is an extremely dangerous act. Discharging a firearm at two individuals in a vehicle in a crowded public area … calls for an exemplary sentence.”
X: @KMartinCourts