On Day 3 of an Edmonton murder trial, people who were at the Duggan Community Hall on the night of a fatal shooting testified.
It happened just after 4 a.m. on Aug. 29, 2021, near 37th Avenue and 106th Street.
Hamza Mohamed was fatally shot.
Abdullahi Yalahow and Christopher Wilson are each charged with second-degree murder. They both pleaded not guilty on Monday. A third man has been charged with manslaughter and is scheduled for trial in June 2024. He’s not part of this trial, however.
CCTV video played during the trial shows both accused — as well as the third man — arriving at the hall at about 12:30 a.m. Yalahow is described by the prosecutors as “a heavier-set Black male” and Wilson as Caucasian. The Crown said CCTV video shows Mohamed arriving just before 4 a.m.
There is a court-ordered publication ban preventing media from airing the surveillance video.
The Crown called witness Sasha Binnom to testify on Wednesday. Binnom was selling drink tickets for a party at the hall that night. She told court there were about 300 people at the hall and that everyone seemed to be having fun.
She told court that when she first heard gunshots, she didn’t know what the noise was. When she saw people running, she thought a fight had broken out so she grabbed her purse and ran to the coat room.
“I was just hiding,” she said. “I was quite scared. I was too scared to leave the corner. I wasn’t sure who was doing what.”
Binnom testified that she remained hidden for three to four minutes and then left, staying outside the hall with another woman.
Then she said they heard someone suddenly yell: “He has a gun! He has a gun!”
She said she saw a Caucasian man who looked drunk walk out of the hall holding a gun.
Everyone dispersed, Binnom said. She went around the school across the street and the man was being arrested.
Binnom told court she was put on an Edmonton Transit Service bus and later interviewed by police.
The second witness called by the Crown on Wednesday was Imelda Ncube.
She told court there were no signs that anything was going to happen leading up to the shooting.
“That was my first time hearing gunshots,” Ncube said. “I thought they were popping the balloons.”
Then people starting screaming: “Gunshots! Gunshots!” she said, and she ran into the kitchen.
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Ncube said, through tears, that there were 10 to 15 people hiding in the kitchen with her. She crouched under a table. She told court she didn’t know who was shooting.
“There was a voice, a girl, telling the person who was shooting to stop. But he kept on going,” Ncube testified.
“It went silent for a minute, then we heard another round of gunshots.”
She said everyone was calling police from their phones.
“We kept on calling the police to come, that there was a shooting.”
Ncube said she stayed in the kitchen until police came in to clear the building. The officers then instructed everyone, including her, to lay on the floor, she said.
“I was facing the guy that they shot,” Ncube said, crying.
She told court she was also put on the bus and later interviewed by police.
An agreed statement of facts, submitted in court Tuesday, states there were two separate CCTV video systems at Duggan Community Hall, which are agreed to accurately show the events depicted. There was also motion-capture security footage from St. Augustine Catholic Elementary School across the road.
Video shown in court indicates the shooting likely started at around 4:02 a.m. When the first shots ring out, CCTV video shows the security guard — who was patting down guests entering the hall — also running out the door.
Police were seen entering the building at 4:13 a.m.
Wilson, shown on CCTV video slurring his words while trying to re-enter the community hall, was arrested by police in the parking lot.
Yalahow was injured in the shooting and taken by car to the University of Alberta Hospital where he was later arrested, court heard Monday.
Later on Wednesday, the Crown called Maulik Raval to testify. Raval was one of the three security guards working that night.
Raval was stationed at the front door. He told court there were metal detectors to be used to screen female guests and the guards were to pat down the male guests.
Raval said the party was busier than expected and they were only hired to stay until 2 a.m. One guard had to leave at 3 a.m. so there were only two after that. He also said the organizer was supposed to help them but didn’t.
“I won’t say that I checked every person. As I said, I was by myself, so I couldn’t get to everybody,” Raval told court.
He said he thought the first gunshot was a balloon popping.
“Everybody was shocked and, I would say, confused… Then after a few seconds, we hear more shots.”
CCTV video shows that Raval was patting down two men just before the shooting started. He said he went outside to his car and took off his security jacket. Then he crossed the road to safety. Raval said he was worried about the other security guard and tried calling him over their radios and then his phone but couldn’t get through.
When police arrived, he saw the other guard.
“He was bleeding from his shin,” Raval said. “He was kind of limping.”
“A white gentleman was telling him: ‘Don’t say anything to police.’”
But Raval said the man walked away and the other guard told police that’s who was shooting and they arrested the man, who Raval said was very impaired – at the very least by alcohol and possibly by drugs as well.
Raval told court he didn’t see the shooting with his own eyes. He said the two other guards were not new and had been working for him for months.
Prosecutors then called witness Oral McLean to testify.
McLean was catering the event at the community hall with his wife and kids.
He told court he initially heard four or five shots, which he also assumed were balloons bursting.
“Everyone hit the ground,” McLean said.
He told court there was a pause before another set of shots were heard.
“After the lull, I peered up and realized there was a shutter there and everybody was on the ground.”
McLean said he stayed calm, got up and tried to close the shutter to the kitchen, thinking of his wife and children’s safety.
People were jumping over the counter and running through the door, he said. McLean said he was able to partly close a shutter and then closed the door. Then, there was another barrage of shots, he told court.
“It was unexpected. It was shocking. I can honestly say I wasn’t scared for myself; I was scared for my wife and kids,” McLean said.
He testified that he laid on top of his wife and daughter, with his two sons right next to them.
“You could hear people scattering all over the place.”
McLean told court that he could see a light-skinned man with a gun in his hand walking towards a group of people, saying: “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you.”
McLean said he could hear the man on the floor “gasping his last breath.”
“I tried to console my wife and kids as best I could.”
He said he and his family stayed in the kitchen until police arrived.
“I’m sure they came as quick as they could, but it felt like an eternity.”
At first, the 20 or so people sheltered in the kitchen didn’t believe police were who they said they were, McLean said. But eventually they came out and followed police instructions to lie down, then exit out the side door to an ETS bus to be interviewed.
Dino Bottos is Wilson’s defence lawyer. Zachary Al-Khatib is Yalahow’s defence lawyer.
On Tuesday, Al-Khatib told court there’s a “history” behind the Aug. 29 incident. He said there was a previous homicide in 2018 and a retaliatory homicide. Al-Khatib said the history involves gang members.
Bottos told court 14 shots came from one handgun and said that gun was the one Mohamed brought to the party, which Wilson later knocked out of his hand. He said out of the 14 gunshots fired from that gun, four are attributable to Wilson.
Bottos said 10 shots can be attributed to Mohamed and he pointed out seven people were injured that night: Mohamed, Yalahow, the security guard and four other party attendees and bystanders.
When it began on Monday, the judge and jury trial was set to last 20 days.
With files from Sarah Ryan, Global News
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