A Nakazdli man has pleaded guilty to manslaughter for his role in a grisly, drug-related murder of a Vanderhoof man on the reserve outside Fort St. James more than eight years ago.
James David Junior Charlie entered the plea Wednesday during a brief hearing in Vancouver, Crown prosecutor Wendy Stephen confirmed. It was in relation to the January 2012 death of Fribjon Bjornson.
Following a five-week trial at the Prince George courthouse, a jury found Charlie guilty in October 2017 of first-degree murder.
But in January, the B.C. Court of Appeal overturned the verdict and ordered a new trial. A three-justice panel found the judge overseeing the trial failed to properly explain to the jury the law on liability for murder.
Bjornson, who was 28 years old at the time of his death, had been buying drugs from Charlie and his friends.
Testimony and evidence indicated that the father of two young children was strangled and beaten to death in an unprovoked attack in the basement of a home on the reserve.
It was the Crown's theory that Charlie provided a wire or cord that one of the other perpetrators used to strangle Bjornson while Charlie went out for a drive in Bjornson's truck.
His body was subsequently dismembered and his head wrapped in a blanket and left in an abandoned house near the scene of the murder, the court heard during the trial.
In June 2018, co-accused Wesley Duncan and Jesse Bird were sentenced to life without parole for at least 15 years after they pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
Charlie's sister, Theresa, who had been in custody for 3 1/2 years, was sentenced to time served on a count of indignity to a dead body.
A so-called Mr. Big sting, where undercover police pose as high-level criminals coax confessions out of the suspects, was used to bring the four to justice.
Charlie had been serving a sentence of life in prison without eligibility for parole for 25 years along with a concurrent term of three years for indignity to a human body.
Stephen said she will be willing to comment on why Charlie's plea was accepted once he has been sentenced.
The victim's mother, Eileen Bjornson, who appeared by video link along with her husband, Fred, from the Prince George courthouse, said in a statement outside court that her family was consulted about the plea agreement.
"We accepted with difficulty knowing the facts of the case, but the idea of having to sit through a whole new trial was more than we could bear," said the mother, who added it has been nearly nine years since her son's death.
"We have been forced to live this death over and over. We are tired. We want to remember Fribjon as he lived, and the kind and thoughtful person he was."
Sentencing will occur in Prince George once a Gladue report has been completed. It is type of a pre-sentencing report a court can request when sentencing an offender of aboriginal background.
- with files from Vancouver Sun
