Dagenais Given Mandatory Life Sentence

Dagenais Given Mandatory Life Sentence

Friday, March 13, 2009 at 14:16

 

 

Spectators clapped this morning as a judge in Saskatoon handed down the mandatory life sentence to a man convicted in the fatal shootings of two Saskatchewan Mounties and the attempted murder of another.

 

Curt Dagenais will not be eligible for parole for 25 years.

 

The 44-year-old Dagenais was convicted yesterday of first-degree murder in the deaths of constables Robin Cameron and Marc Bourdages.

 

He was also convicted of attempted murder in the shooting of Const. Michelle Knopp.

 

During his trial, Dagenais testified that he shot the RCMP constables in 2006, but claimed it was in self-defence.

 

The Crown argued it was Dagenais who surprised the RCMP with gunfire and then lied in court in a bid to get away with murder.

 

Cameron’s father, Howard, says the verdict was bittersweet — because the victims’ families don’t get their loved ones back.

 

Bourdages’ widow says she has struggled to explain what happened to their young son.

 

(courtesy of The Canadian Press)