Accused’s fate rests in jury’s hands

An offence that comes very low on the scale of things Yukon law enforcers deal with on a daily basis has ended up in front of a Yukon Supreme Court jury this week, with the trial of Keith Bunbury.

An offence that comes very low on the scale of things Yukon law enforcers deal with on a daily basis has ended up in front of a Yukon Supreme Court jury this week, with the trial of Keith Bunbury.

Bunbury, 44, was charged with assaulting one man, threatening another and committing an assault during a break and enter following an incident on Nov. 28, 2009.

On Wednesday morning, the jury heard from the alleged victim, Jeremiah Meneeley.

He said he and his roommate were watching a movie when they heard a loud bang on the side of their house, located on the corner of Third Avenue and and Alexander Street in downtown Whitehorse.

It sounded as if a car had bumped up against the house, he said, so he and his roommate went outside to see what had happened.

Outside, Meneeley said, he saw no one but a lone man walking away from the house.

“I said, ‘Are you the asshole that kicked the s—- out of my house?’” Meneeley told the court.

When Bunbury took the stand in his own defence, he said he had knocked on the door, hoping to find a friend of his whom he believed lived in the house. When no one came to the door, he said, he kept walking.

“Then some guy came out and started yelling and swearing at me ... and threatened to shoot me.”

Meneeley denied threatening to shoot Bunbury.

When Bunbury’s lawyer asked if Meneeley was being aggressive toward his client, Meneeley replied, “I’m not a fighter.”

That prompted the defence to bring up Meneeley’s criminal record. It includes a conviction of spousal assault, two sexual assaults and a manslaughter conviction.

Meneeley said he quickly went back inside after Bunbury began walking toward the house, removing his jacket as he did.

Bunbury admitted he followed Meneeley into the house, although he denied pushing Meneeley’s roommate, Bruce Webber, out of the way.

“I was scared but I was kinda angry at the same time,” Bunbury told the court.

When his lawyer asked why he didn’t simply run away, he said: “I figured if I caught up to him first, I’d stop him before he got a gun.”

Prosecutor K.C. Komosky pressed Bunbury further on that question, asking him why he went in the direction of the threat instead of away from it.

“If he wanted to shoot me, I wouldn’t even have made it to the alley,” Bunbury insisted. “... But it wasn’t even like that. I didn’t sit down and think, ‘I can’t run away.’ I just wanted to stop him.”

Once inside the house, the two men grappled. Meneeley claims that Bunbury punched him in the head about four times and that he didn’t fight back but only defended himself. Bunbury claims punches were thrown in both directions.

“I said to Brucie, ‘Get my gun,’” Meneeley told the court. “It was the only thing I could think to say. I was really scared.”

Meneeley doesn’t own a gun, as he told the court, but was trying to scare Bunbury away.

Webber left the room and Bunbury followed.

“I just went after where I thought the gun was,” Bunbury said. “ ... I didn’t want to be running away with my back to them with a gun .... At the time, I thought they coulda shot me in the back.”

As he moved through the kitchen, Bunbury grabbed a knife. He described it as a paring knife which he picked up from the counter, while Meneeley described it as a large cooking knife taken from the butcher block.

Bunbury followed Webber into one of the bedrooms.

“Keith had the knife in his hand and said, ‘Where’s the gun, aren’t you going to shoot me?’” Webber recalled. “I said, ‘I don’t got no gun.’”

With that, Bunbury turned and left out the back door.

He told the court he tried to leave out the door he had entered through but that he couldn’t get it open because Meneeley was on the outside holding it shut.

Meneeley said he was waiting at the door for Bunbury to leave, but that it was open.

That ended the altercation. From the house on Third, Bunbury headed to the Salvation Army, where he got into an argument with someone after being told to leave because he was drunk. He was arrested outside the Chilkoot Inn a few minutes later.

The RCMP officer who booked Bunbury said he was calm and polite, saying “please” and “thank you” as the officer read him his rights.

In his closing arguments Thursday, Bunbury’s lawyer, Malcolm Campbell, told the jury his client was essentially acting in self-defence when he fought with Meneeley because he thought Meneeley had a gun and was willing to use it.

As soon as Bunbury realized it was a farce, he left quickly and quietly, Campbell said.

As for the assault with a weapon charge, Campbell said there was never any assault.

His client approached Webber with the knife held at his side, not in a threatening pose, and asked if there was a gun. Again, once he asertained there was none, he left.

This morning, Supreme Court Justice Mary Lou Benotto instructed the jury members on the legal aspects of the case, describing the steps they must take in considering the evidence.

They had not reached a verdict by press time early this afternoon.