The two paramedics who failed to provide the necessaries of life to 19-year-old shooting victim Yosif Al-Hasnawi are expected to be sentenced in a Hamilton, Ont., court on Tuesday.
Steve Snively and Christopher Marchant, who treated the teen on the night of Dec. 2, 2017, will learn their fate eight months after a justice revealed his guilty decision in early June.
The judge-only trial lasted 32 days and heard testimony from numerous witnesses, experts and Al-Hasnawi’s family and friends.
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At question was the conduct of two paramedics after the victim was shot during an altercation on Sanford Avenue near Main Street East.
The basis of the Crown’s case surrounded the actions of the accused, which were characterized as unprofessional and suggested failures in their treatment which endangered Al-Hasnawi’s life.
The teen was injured after he, his brothers and some friends confronted Dale King and another male who were allegedly accosting an older man not far from a central Hamilton mosque.
In the decision, Justice Harrison Arrell said the pair failed to conclude that Al-Hasnawi suffered a penetrating wound to the abdomen, making it a “load-and-go situation of the highest emergency” requiring immediate transport to a trauma hospital.
Two Hamilton paramedics criminally charged
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The judge suggested the paramedics failed to “keep an open mind” and act according to minimum standards expected of any properly trained paramedic.
Arrell ruled that instead of following extensive training as professionals, they listened to “rumours and innuendo” around them at the scene that Al-Hasnawi had a superficial wound.
“I conclude these failures by the accused were not simple inadvertence, thoughtlessness or simple error in judgment, but instead was a conscious decision to ignore the obvious evidence before them,” Arrell said in reading his decision.
During the trial, the Crown suggested that Marchant participated “in a dangerous lift” after surveillance video showed the paramedic and a Hamilton police officer lift Al-Hasnawi by his arms from the concrete sidewalk.
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The defence argued the paramedics had an “honest belief” that the victim was suffering from only a pellet gun wound and psychiatric issues, thus not seeing a need to rush the patient to a trauma centre.
A number of witnesses also alleged Snively and Marchant took too long to treat and take Al-Hasnawi to hospital.
The defendants insisted some of the delay was due to the patient’s “uncooperative and extremely combative” nature during treatment.
Arrell suggested otherwise, saying video shown in court appeared to show a patient lying on the sidewalk in a relatively “placid state.”
The two were found “jointly guilty” under Section 215(3) of the criminal code for failing to provide the necessaries of life.