Jordan Manners shooting ‘a horrible, tragic accident’: Defence lawyer

TORONTO — Jordan Manners was shot by accident, says the lawyer for one of two men accused of murdering the 15-year-old student in the spring of 2007.

C.D. and J.W., who cannot be named because they were youths at the time of the offence, are charged with first-degree murder in Jordan’s shooting, and are being tried for a second time after the first ended in a mistrial. Jordan, who was friends with both of the accused, died in the hallways of C.W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute from a single gunshot wound to the heart.

Lawyer James Silver, who represents C.D., said the evidence does not support the Crown’s murder theory.

“An accident happened, a horrible, tragic accident, but an accident nonetheless,” Mr. Silver told the jury Monday as closing arguments in the trial commenced.

Contrary to the Crown’s theory that Jordan was robbed and murdered, Mr. Silver suggested the 15-year-old, who had an interest in firearms, went into a quiet school bathroom with two unidentified men to check out a gun. At some point, Mr. Silver said, the weapon accidentally went off.

“Jordan Manners was an innocent, but he had an interest in guns… It’s simple but tragic,” Mr. Silver told the jury.

Testimony from Y.M., a key witness in the case who retracted the story she told police after first implicating the two accused, could not be trusted, he added. The girl’s initial evidence, while “summoned from a grain of truth,” was a fabricated tale based on rumours speculation, Mr. Silver said.

“It would be dangerous to convict on her evidence,” he said.

Closing arguments continue Monday afternoon.