Pair charged in murder plot get new court date
Posted Mar 6, 2015 12:06:28 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
HALIFAX – The case of two people accused of plotting to open fire on shoppers in a Halifax mall will return to court on April 10 to set a date for a preliminary hearing.
Twenty-three-year-old Lindsay Kanittha Souvannarath of Geneva, Ill., and 20-year-old Randall Steven Shepherd of Halifax were charged last month with conspiracy to commit murder.
They also face charges of conspiracy to commit arson, illegal possession of weapons for a dangerous purpose and making a threat through social media.
The new date in the case was set today during a hearing in provincial court.
Crown lawyer Shauna MacDonald said they received disclosure yesterday and need time to process it.
“The matter’s been put over for a month for the purposes of the Crown to give defence further disclosure,” she said. “They have their limited disclosure at this point. Obviously, giving it is one thing, going through it is another thing, so we picked a month to check in.”
MacDonald said police are still sifting through evidence.
“It’s a process where you gather things, review them, determine what’s relevant, and then it gets forwarded to us. So they’re still in that process.”
Police allege the plot could have resulted in mass casualties at the Halifax Shopping Centre on Valentine’s Day.
MacDonald said the conspiracy charge is based on the notion that some kind of agreement had been reached between the accused.
The Crown information alleges the offences took place between Jan. 6 and Valentine’s Day and were carried out in concert with James Lee Gamble, a 19-year-old man found dead in his Halifax home on Feb. 13.
None of the allegations have been proven in court.
