An inmate at the North Fraser Pretrial Centre will serve an additional 12 months in jail for a vicious attack that left a fellow inmate badly injured and burned.
The accused, who is only identified as J.P.B in the reasons for sentence because of a prior youth criminal record, was found to have thrown hot butter in the face of an inmate. While the victim began clutching his face, the accused began punching and kicking him until guards were able to intervene.
Last month Judge Shehni Dossa sentence J.P.B. to 18 months minus six months for time served. He will also have to submit a DNA sample and is prohibited from possessing weapons for ten years.
The sentence stems from an incident on New Year's Eve 2010 that took place while inmates at the jail were eating breakfast in the C-Pod unit.
Surveillance footage of the incident showed the accused taking a liquid out of the microwave, before tossing it on the inmate. The victim suffered second degree burns on his face, forehead, neck, lips and cheek and had drainage issues in his left ear and a swollen eye as a result of the blows to the head.
In the victim impact statement the inmate said since the attack he has suffered emotional issues and feels nervous, less confident and depressed.
At trial the defence said that 25-year-old inmate had no previous altercations with his victim and was pressured to act by other inmates. The lawyer argued that the accused, who was serving a four and a half month sentence at the time, has a personality disorder and substance abuse problems.
Still, J.P.B.'s defence conceded that the attack was unprovoked and doctors at the institution believe that the accused is at a high risk to re-offend.
In her reasons for sentence the judge also noted the accused has a long criminal history. J.P.B. has 17 property related offences, 14 breaches or failures to comply, six driving while prohibited offences, two drug offences, possession of a weapon, three offences for uttering threats and four offences of flight from a police officer and resisting arrest. His record starts as a youth in 2001.
