A notorious South Okanagan criminal will be released from custody after being sentenced to time-served for assaulting a jail guard and two other prisoners while in custody.
Afshin Maleki Ighani, 48, pleaded guilty in B.C. Supreme Court in Penticton on Tuesday to two counts of assault with a weapon and one count of assaulting a peace officer.
According to court documents, Ighani stabbed fellow inmates David McHale and Peter Beckett on Sept. 9, 2017, at the Okanagan Correctional Centre (OCC) near Oliver, B.C.
In a civil lawsuit filed against the OCC on Nov. 22, 2017, McHale said a jail guard forgot to lock a yard door before Ighani burst in and targeted him.
“He proceeded to stab at me with a sharp shank and punch my head,” McHale said in the notice of civil claim. “He cut my hand, arm and shirt.”
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McHale said his safety was jeopardized as he was supposed to be “in a protected situation at all times.” McHale was in protective custody at the time facing sex crimes against children.
A year and a half after the prison attack, McHale was sentenced to 8.3 years in prison for his crimes. He pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual interference of a person under 16 and one count of the same offense involving a person under 14.
Ighani’s other jailhouse victim, Peter Beckett, was in protective custody facing a first-degree murder charge for drowning his wife Laura Letts-Beckett while boating near Revelstoke in 2010.
Just days after Beckett was stabbed by Ighani at the jail, he was found guilty of killing his wife and received a mandatory life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.
Ighani also admitted to assaulting a female corrections officer at the OCC on Mar. 14, 2018.
Justice Elizabeth MacDonald agreed to a joint sentencing submission of 12 months’ jail, concurrent for the two Sept. 9, 2017, assaults and nine months jail for the assault on the officer.
Ighani was handed a total sentence of 21 months behind bars, but given credit for 33 months’ time served, he will be set free.
Ighani has been in custody since April 22, 2017, when he was arrested for an alleged armed kidnapping.
Ighani’s freedom comes two weeks after he was acquitted on all 10 counts related to the April 22, 2017, incident near Princeton, including kidnapping and weapons offences.
Ighani has a history of firearms and drug trafficking-related charges. He was the subject of two deportation orders in 2002 and 2007 that were later cancelled.
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