A young Prince George man is facing a further 3 1/2 years in jail for shooting a man who confronted him and a fellow culprit caught sneaking onto a neighbour's property.
In all, Crown and defence counsels are seeking via a joint submission a sentence of five years less credit for time served prior to sentencing for Smitty Ralph Bent, 21, for a Sept. 24, 2017 incident that began when the man was in the back yard of his home on the edge of the VLA neighbourhood.
It was just 11 p.m. and he was enjoying some time with his wife and family, the court was told during a hearing Friday in provincial court, when he heard noises coming from his neighbour's yard.
Normally, the neighbour's dog would be barking but not this time, leading him to suspect there were intruders looking to carry out a theft under the cover of darkness. When he looked closer, he saw two young men and when he yelled at them, they took off.
Fed up with the rampant crime in the area, the man "did an unwise thing" and and decided to go after them. He grabbed his BB gun, got in his car, drove into the VLA and found them in the 2200 block of Oak Street.
He got out but left his gun in the car and launched into an extended, expletive-filled tirade, in part telling them to "get a life" and accusing them of "creeping around people's back yards like little stalkers."
The two he had taken to task were much younger and lighter and could simply have ran off, the court was told. But they opted not to.
Instead, one of them pulled out a can of pepper spray and tried to turn it on the man. But he failed to check the direction of the wind and the spray blew back on him.
The man laughed and said words to the effect of "you're such an idiot, you can't even work a can of mace."
By that point he had stopped moving towards the two and wasn't yelling at them anymore. But Bent pulled out a .22 calibre rifle and pulled the trigger.
The man suffered a "through-and-through bullet wound" that punctured his right lung and splintered his shoulder blade. He nearly bled to death and ended up hospital for over a week.
Fast forward to this month, and he is still feeling the effects. He has trouble breathing and using one of his arms, the court was told.
Bent and his accomplice ran away but eventually tracked down by the RCMP and taken into custody. For reasons not made clear, RCMP released him from custody two days later, but by January 2018, he was back in custody on other charges and has remained there ever since.
Bent pleaded guilty to discharging a firearm with intent to wound, and what to do with him has been a topic of discussion between Crown and defence counsels for the past nine months.
Although the mandatory minimum for Brent's offence is four years, cases like his usually draw sentences in the range of six to eight years.
But working against that is the fact that Bent has effectively been living on the streets and "raising himself" since he was 13 years old, falling into the gang and drug culture in the process.
Defence counsel Brian Gilson pointed out his client's thin and gangly frame and described Bent as someone who tried to act tough but is actually soft inside and will be out of his element in the federal system.
However, Gilson also said Bent has acknowledged he needs to spend time behind bars for his actions and also sees his sentence as an opportunity to get his life turned around and on track.
Judge Peter McDermick will make a decision on sentencing at a later date.
