WINNIPEG — Day three of the first-degree murder trial of Devin Hall started off with a Winnipeg police forensics officer describing what she called “a significant scene.”
The 2012 double shooting at the Salisbury House restaurant killed 23-year-old Jeffrey Lau and injured one of his friends.
READ MORE: ‘It felt like an eternity’: witness recalls spray of gunshots during Salisbury House murder trial
Const. Susan Colleen Roy-Haegeman, an identification exhibit officer with the Winnipeg Police Service, testified Friday morning.
She recalled collecting a total of 19 shell casings from a semi-automatic weapon, 12 from inside the restaurant and another seven from outside the front windows.
“There was a lot of damage,” Roy-Haegeman told the court. “This was a significant scene that was going to require a significant amount of work.”
The officer said she collected a total of 72 exhibits.
“I kind of remember walking (into the restaurant) and being like, wow, this is gonna be a lot of work,” she said. “(There was) food, bloody clothing, blood. It was a significant scene.”
On Sept. 27, 2012, Lau was having breakfast in the restaurant with five other friends when a masked gunman stormed in just after 3 a.m. and opened fire.
READ MORE: ‘Save my friend’: Jury hears chilling details from Salisbury House murder
A 14-second surveillance video of the gunman was released publicly earlier in the week.
WATCH: Gunman enters Salisbury House and opens fire
On Thursday, Dr. John Younes, a forensic pathologist told the court Lau had five bullet wounds, likely from 4 shots (one re-entered his bicep) and died later in hospital.
Lau suffered massive blood loss and the jury was told he died within minutes.
Const. Roy-Haegeman was called to the scene shortly before 3:30 a.m. to assist in the investigation and collection of evidence.
Later that morning, a semi-automatic pistol, black gloves and a white shirt were recovered from a secondary scene.
Roy-Haegeman testified that no fingerprints found on the gun but said that does not mean it was never handled.
“If we don’t find fingerprints on an item, it does not mean the item hasn’t been handled,” she said. “They could have been wearing gloves.”
Roy-Haegeman said she took gunshot residue from the gloves and sent them to an RCMP laboratory for analysis.
WATCH: Recap from the first few days of Devin Hall murder trial
She also testified that she had watched the surveillance video multiple times.
“I remember one occasion where I had viewed it over and over and over,” she said.
It was after that she asked the lab to test the shirt found for “biological material” in certain areas of the shirt.
“The shirt wasn’t being worn as you would wear that type of shirt. It was actually being used as a scarf,” she said.
The surveillance video of the shooting, which was shown to jurors and released to the public on Thursday, shows a masked person walking into the restaurant, raising a gun, walking off frame, then seconds later running out.
Devin Hall has pleaded not guilty to first degree murder and attempted murder.
The trial is scheduled to last until the end of June.
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