TORONTO STAR GT3

.... MONDAY. FtBRUAK

GREATER TORONTO

Ford orders sand moved Not guilty verdict in

Residents’ problems
teen’s knife slaying
and disputes continue Man who shot aunt Omar
Wellington was
to keep mayor busy of witness acquitted confined and
savagely beaten

DAVID RIDER
but not free for hours before
URBAN AFFAIRS BUREAU CHIEF he was stabbed
BETSY POWELL to death in
For Garnett Pryce, Dec. 15 will al­
ways be the day that the mayor of COURTS BUREAU 2006.
Canada’s biggest city led an entou­ A Toronto jury has acquitted a man
of first-degree murder in the horrif­ Four young men have already
rage to his backyard and decreed r:
ic 2006 knife slaying of 17-year-old pleaded guilty to assault causing
that a thigh-high pile of sand shall
Omar Wellington. bodily harm and aggravated assault.
be moved. \ The accused, J.G., is 22 but can’t be One has since been shot to death.
“I think that’s unbecoming of a rv*-'
BpESPfef identified because he was under 18 The Crown's star witness was the
mayor — I don’t think he should
become involved in such a petty DAVID RIDER/TORONTO STAR at the time the teenager was older brother of one of the young
issue,” Pryce said. “He has staff, Garnett Pryce shows the spot in his backyard where there was once a pile stabbed to death in Flemingdon men who pleaded guilty.
Park. The witness - known only as D.W.
councillors, labour negotiations. of sand. Mayor Rob Ford personally ordered the sand pile moved.
The jury retired Wednesday after­ to avoid identilying his brother —
When did the mayor get involved in
Jan. 21 at a cost of $1JOO. He's upset noon to begin deliberations and re­ testified he saw J.G. with a badly
such small matters?” nation of a neighbourly feud.
Pryce says his engineer blamed because neither Ford nor Di Gior- turned to court Saturday to say beaten Wellington on a bench not
But Rob Ford is no regular mayor.
there was an impasse. far from 61 Grenoble Dr., a housing
Among the many ways he stands destabilized soil next to a wall on $o invited him to the meeting or complex near Don Mills Rd. and
out is the time he spends trying to runoff from a concrete slab in his asked for his side of the story. Nei­ Justice Mary Lou Benotto exhort­
solve resident complaints about neighbour’s yard. The neighbour ther Ford nor the neighbour re­ ed the jm-ors to continue delibera­ Eglinton Ave. E.
The young man, who suffers from
city services and mediating even denies that, and accuses Pryce’s sponded to requests for comment. tions.
paranoid schizophrenia, testified
the smallest disputes. builders of damaging the slab. In another December episode At 10 a.m. Sunday, they said they
Pryce says he learned from anoth­ demonstrating Ford’s eagerness to had found J.G. “not guilty.” he heard J.G. tell Wellington.
Tireless shoe-leather constituen­
"We are happy that the jury came ’’Come with me, you’re dead.”
cy work helped make him famous er neighbour on Dec. 15 that "the get involved, he responded to a plea J.G. and J.J. then walked off with
as the councillor for Ward 2, Etob­ mayor and an entourage were in for help from Shondra Nauth. who to the right decision, and that finally
icoke North. In March 2010. just the (other) neighbour’s yard, for years has fought the city over this matter has come to a conclu­ Wellington, he said.
sewage from neighbours flooding sion for all involved.” defence law­ But defence lawyers Adam
before announcing his mayoral run, looking at your property.” Schultz and Susan Adams argued
he described the work as a kind of Local councillor Frank Di Giorgio her basement. yer Adam Schultz said Sunday.
compulsion, noting he once bolted was among them. Di Giorgio (Ward Ford told her he would set up a J.G. is not, however, a free man. In J.G. was not present
Dec. 2010, he received a 12-year They said D.W. was unreliable and
from a family Mother’s Day party 12, YorkSouth-Weston) said Pryce’s meeting with city water staff and a untrustworthy because of a bad
when a resident called. neighbour’s daughter-in-law called city lawyer, she said. But he later left adult prison sentence after plead­
ing guilty to two counts of attempt­ memory and inconsistent evidence
The mayor gives out his cellphone him and city inspectors to the prop­ a voicemail with a city offer to buy
ed murder. and, said Adams, “not only becausE'
number, returns calls into the wee erty, but it appeared no rules were her five-bedroom Wilson Heights
Blvd. home — an offer she says is On OcL 9,2006. J.G. shot a young he has a mental health issue.”
hours and makes personal visits. being broken. So she called Ford.
“The mayor, in his typical fashion, well below market value. woman in the face — she is the aunt D.W. suffered an hallucinatory ep­
Between July and October 2011 he
In the message, Ford said: “I have of one of the witnesses in the Wel­ isode while testifying last Novem­
logged 209 meetings with residents his preference is always to meet on­
ber, forcing the trial to adjourn for
— an average of two per day. site.” Di Giorgio said. "He asked me talked to the solicitor and, like I’ve lington case.
He also tried to shoot a security several weeks. The trial began on
Two councillors told the Star they to attend. He made clear at the end said before, there’s a million dollars
have learned of the mayor spending of the day that this is a civil matter we’ll pay you for your house, and guard but the gun misfired. He was Nov. 7,201L
arrested a few days later and has On the fifth day of his evidence,
considerable time with constitu­ and there’s not a whole lot the city that’s it. So ifyou’re going to come in
and not take it or tell your lawyers been in custody since. D.W. told court Wellington had
ents who are frequent callers to can do.
On July 14 that year, Wellington come back to life and was in the
their offices and are considered by 'There was sand at the back to to not take it, you’re completely
staff to be. as one put it, “troubled” finish grading Staff told me they wasting your time and my time.” was confined and savagely beaten courtroom.
for hours before he was stabbed. During her dosing remarks last
Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday said would usually let some building
Another male who was under IS at week. Crown attorney Anna Ten
some will find fault with Ford, but “I material stay there if he was in the
the time, J,J.. pleaded guilty to first- house told the jury his hallucina
think he does care about the little process of construction. It was tire SAND CASTLE
tion was the result of stress and
V ID E O

guy and I guess it’s hard to stop. You mayor’s decision to have that sand degree murder for "aiding and en­
Tour the now sand-free couraging” in Wellington’s murder guilt over not saving Wellington’s
can call it micro-managing, but the removed. He said, ’Look, if he’s not backyard of Garnett — payback because tire teen did not life. He had also smoked pot that
problem isn’t micro for the people going to take a proactive move to
Pryce's Toronto home. dehver on a promised gun. day.
involved” remove the sand, we’ll order him to
The Crown alleged J.G. was the “I hope you saw he was trying his
Ford banishing sand from the yard remove it.’ ”
Pryce said a city inspector told person who stabbed Wellington 31 best as he struggled with the task of
of Pryce’s Black Creek Dr.-Law- thestar.com/videos times. giving evidence,” she said.
rence Ave. W, home was the culmi- him to move the sand. He did on

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