The Brockville, Ont., teenage girl convicted of manslaughter in the death of Damian Sobieraj was sentenced on Monday.
After emotional statements from both families involved, Justice Kimberely Moore sentenced the now 16-year-old youth to 11 months custody and 25 months’ conditional supervision under a surety.
This is on top of the five months she already spent in custody pre-trial.
Its been nearly two years since the body of Sobieraj was found in the St. Lawrence River near the Hardy Park boardwalk in downtown Brockville.
The courts found in February that a 13-year-old-girl, who still cannot be identified per the Youth Criminal Justice Act, ‘body checked’ him into the water where he drowned, constituting manslaughter.
Sobieraj’s mother, Iwona, read an emotional statement about Sept. 13, the night her son went missing.
“When I spoke to the officer that night, I knew something bad had happened,” Sobieraj said.
“Every night I looked at a picture of him and (called) for help. You could imagine how scared we were.”
The father of the convicted teen also spoke on Monday, delivering an emotional speech.
“She’s not evil — shes not a monster that social media made her out to be,” said the father.
The Crown prosecutor, Alan Findlay, revealed new details from the investigation, such as a time when the convicted teen was in a police investigation room singing the lyrics to Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody: “just killed a man.”
The new defence lawyer for the case, Mash Frouhar, defended her client, saying that it was a coping mechanism and compared it to laughing at a funeral.
Sobieraj’s good friend, Jennifer Pelletier, also spoke passionately during the sentencing on Monday.
“How am I going to live in a world without my best friend,” said Pelletier.
As for whats next, justice Moore says the teen needs to continue counselling and to remember Iwona Sobreiraj the next time she gets angry.
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