A Kelowna, B.C., man who recently overturned his 2020 second-degree murder conviction will not be walking away from the courts scot-free.
The BC Prosecution Service said Steven Pirko has indicated to the court he will plead guilty on July 6 to manslaughter.
Pirko was convicted in 2020 of the 2014 bludgeoning death of Christopher Ausman, whom he attacked while Ausman and his friend were engaged in an altercation. Earlier this year that conviction was overturned in the court of appeal.
“The matter will proceed to sentencing on that day. As the matter remains before the court the BCPS will have no further comment at this time,” a representative of the BC Prosecution Service said Thursday.
Ausman’s mother said in April that the decision to overturn the conviction hit her family, which had to endure a lengthy trial and a long wait for the matter to even get to court, hard.
“It is like we are starting all over from day one,” Hutton said.
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“This brings up so many memories from Chris’s death and the trial. It is sad that the criminals, it seems, have more rights than the victim and family.”
The appeal was granted when a three-justice panel of B.C.’s highest court said the trial judge “misdirected” the jury on the section of the Criminal Code that allows for the lawful defence of another, and failed to help jury members understand how the offence of manslaughter could apply.
The trial judge’s errors “were not harmless,” Justice Gregory Fitch said in the decision, and “cannot be cured” through other legal measures.
“The cumulative effect of the errors resulted in an unsatisfactory trial.”
Since January 2020, Pirko has been serving a life sentence with no chance of parole for 11 years.
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