Witness says she fought with man accused of shooting pregnant woman at Vancouver print shop
Credit to Author: Keith Fraser| Date: Thu, 31 Oct 2019 00:51:16 +0000
A Crown witness Wednesday described a confrontation she had with a man accused of shooting a pregnant woman in a Vancouver printing shop.
Dollie Middleton was testifying at the trial of Carleton Stevens, who has pleaded not guilty to the attempted murder of the victim, who cannot be identified due to a publication ban.
During her testimony she and Stevens glared at one another, as she sat in the witness box and he sat in the prisoner’s dock.
Middleton said that before the May 2018 shooting, she had been working in the early morning hours at East Van Graphics on Industrial Avenue and after finishing her work had gotten some food to take up to a loft where she slept with her partner, Alan Benty.
She told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Jennifer Duncan that she heard a “really loud noise” and thought that she had left something on in the print shop.
Under questioning from Crown counsel Joanna Medjuck, Middleton said she woke up her partner and told him that another employee, Taj Lovett, was in trouble and needed help.
Middleton said she followed Benty down the stairs and walked over to an office where she saw a man, who she described as “the first guy,” drop a knife and run past her before leaving the building. She said she followed the man outside and when she went back into the shop, she saw the six-months pregnant woman naked except for her sports bra.
“She had been shot. She had a hole in her belly,” Middleton said.
Police investigate a shooting in Vancouver on May 18, 2018.
Middleton said she was a “little confused” as to when she first saw the shooting victim, who was later taken to hospital but lost her unborn child.
“I remember seeing her coming down the stairs. She was going into shock. She was walking like she was in a trance or something,” she said. “She said to me, ‘He shot me.’ I said, ‘I know he did.’ I wanted to get her to sit down or something.”
She could see that the victim, who had earlier been sleeping in the shop with Lovett, was bleeding and got her to sit down in a chair, she said.
Asked by Medjuck as to who else she saw in the shop, Middleton pointed in the courtroom toward Stevens, who she indicated was above her in a loft.
“I yelled at him. I said, ‘Who the f..k are you!?’ Then I said, ‘You shot her.’ He said, ‘No I didn’t. There’s no gun here.’ I said, ‘Yes, there is. There’s a hole in her f..king belly and you did it.’ ”
A short while later Stevens came down the stairs and confronted her, and she punched him in the face, she said. “He tried to punch me back and hit me in the shoulder,” she said.
At that point Stevens moved back and pulled out a gun, pointed the firearm at her and fired one shot by her feet, said Middleton.
The Crown also played a 911 call that Middleton made in which she frantically tells the dispatcher that a pregnant woman has been shot. She can be heard telling the dispatcher that she herself had been shot at and demanding an ambulance be sent. When the dispatcher asks her who had the gun, she says she doesn’t know and adds that there are two guys in the shop.
“They shot (the victim). She’s going to die. Please hurry,” Middleton told the dispatcher.
Chandra Corriveau, Stevens’ lawyer, began her cross-examination of Middleton late Wednesday and is expected to conclude Friday morning.