All Posts Tagged With: "Jun Lin"
Profs want Magnotta interview kept private
Accused killer participated in sex worker survey
Researchers from the University of Ottawa are trying to prevent the Crown from getting their hands on a six-year-old interview with Luka Rocco Magnotta.
Lawyers representing the academics argued in Quebec Superior Court on Wednesday the interview with a subject known under the pseudonym “Jimmy” should be kept confidential.
The lawyers say Magnotta participated in the study as part of a survey of sex workers under the condition his interview would remain confidential. Magnotta’s lawyers, who have supported the researchers’ motion, filed an affidavit confirming that later Wednesday.
Montreal police want a copy of the interview for evidence they’re still gathering against Magnotta.
The 30-year-old is charged with first-degree murder in the slaying and dismemberment of Chinese engineering student Jun Lin.
Police came to know about the interview after a research assistant, Adam McLeod, told them about it following Magnotta’s arrest last year. McLeod told authorities “Jimmy” was in fact Magnotta.
Luka Magnotta had paranoid schizophrenia
Court document reveals accused killer was hospitalized
Luka Magnotta, accused of killing and dismembering a Chinese student, was treated for paranoid schizophrenia, though his pyschiatrist said he didn’t always take his medication.
A letter from a psychiatrist who saw Magnotta, 30, is attached to the court file on a 2005 conviction for fraud and references the diagnosis of the “major psychiatric disorder.”
The letter was released today after several media outlets fought for it to be made public.
The doctor at the Rouge Valley Health System in Toronto says Magnotta suffered from paranoid schizophrenia since at least 2000 and had been hospitalized several times.
The psychiatrist writes that Magnotta, then known by his birth name Eric Newman, was on anti-psychotic medications but didn’t always take them, which the doctor said could lead to paranoia, auditory hallucinations and fear of the unknown.
A preliminary hearing for Magnotta, is underway in Montreal, where he faces several criminal charges, including first-degree murder, in the gruesome slaying and dismemberment last year of 33-year-old university student Jun Lin.
The newly released letter was attached to Magnotta’s fraud court file at his sentencing, when the judge handed him a conditional sentence for fraud. After reading the letter she warned that Magnotta would always need to take medication, and if he didn’t, she predicted his life “is going to get messed up.”
A Globe and Mail reporter tried to obtain the letter, a public document, but was rebuffed in several attempts. Media outlets then hired counsel to make arguments to a judge for the letter’s release.
Magnotta’s lawyer Luc Leclair tried to stop the letter from becoming public, but Ontario Court Judge Fergus O’Donnell ruled Wednesday afternoon that it should be released.
It does contain sensitive and personal medical information, O’Donnell said in his ruling, but any privacy interest was foregone when the letter was filed in open court.
“Without access to the letter, the public is not in a position to engage in a meaningful assessment or debate over the appropriateness of what happened to Mr. Newman in 2005 in what is supposed to be an open and transparent court process,” O’Donnell wrote.
Jun Lin’s mother says she’s been robbed of will to live
Preliminary inquiry wraps up in Montreal
The mother of slain Chinese student Jun Lin says that 10 months after her son’s killing she no longer has the will to live.
The 33-year-old Lin was killed and dismembered last May in Montreal in a case that made headlines around the world.
Lin’s family met with journalists Tuesday as the preliminary hearing for his accused killer — Luka Rocco Magnotta — is on a break at the city’s courthouse.
They wanted to honour Lin’s memory ahead of the Qingming festival, a traditional Chinese date for families to commemorate ancestors and the deceased.
Speaking through an interpreter, Lin’s emotional mother, Zhigui Du, said she still struggles daily with the loss of her son.
“She said that before, she was full of hope for life… (She now has) no interest to live in this world,” said the interpreter as she translated for Du, who broke down in tears a couple of times while talking about Lin.
Continue reading Jun Lin’s mother says she’s been robbed of will to live
Magnotta appears to wipe tears at hearing
Journalist from England’s Sun newspaper testifies
The man accused of killing and dismembering a Chinese foreign student appeared to wipe away tears Thursday as more evidence against him was introduced at a preliminary hearing.
Luka Rocco Magnotta has been mainly impassive during the four days he’s spent in a courtroom, sitting with his arms folded and listening without emotion.
But on Thursday, he appeared to wipe away tears while a Montreal police investigator gave evidence.
Shackled and sitting in a fortified prisoner’s box in a high-security courtroom, Magnotta lifted his hand to his mouth during testimony and rubbed and wiped his eyes from under a pair of glasses.
Magnotta, 30, is charged with first-degree murder in the slaying last May of Jun Lin, a Concordia University engineering student from China.
Grieving dad breaks down at Magnotta hearing
Daran Lin flees courtroom
Daran Lin on March 11 (Ryan Remiorz/CP)
A Chinese father left a courtroom in tears after hearing evidence at the preliminary inquiry of Luka Magnotta, who is accused of killing and dismembering his son.
Overcome with emotion, Daran Lin left the courtroom helped by his translator and lawyer Tuesday, trembling and weeping, and he did not return.
A lawyer for the family said the grieving father of Jun Lin had been given a general idea of things he might hear at the preliminary inquiry.
But it proved to be too much for the elder Lin.
“He decided to take the afternoon off,” said Daniel Urbas, a Montreal commercial-litigation lawyer who is acting pro-bono as the family’s attorney.
“He’s gone back to be with his wife and his daughter.”
The Lin family has made the trip to Canada, at considerable cost, in order to honour their relative’s memory and follow the legal proceedings.
Continue reading Grieving dad breaks down at Magnotta hearing
Canadian Press criticized for “Newsmaker of the Year”
Luka Rocco Magnotta was editors’ top choice
Lin Jun, Luka Rocco Magnotta's victim (Facebook)
The selection of Luka Rocco Magnotta as Canada’s 2012 Newsmaker of the Year lit up the country’s social media and news web sites on Sunday with a cyclone of outrage and condemnation.
The alleged killer, who now sits in a Montreal detention centre as his case goes through the legal process, was the subject of a global manhunt last spring after a Chinese engineering student was killed, his body cut up and remains mailed to four different locations in Ottawa and British Columbia.
The event, including Magnotta’s capture last June at a Berlin internet cafe, was splashed across newspaper front pages and Web sites all over the world.
Magnotta was chosen in the annual poll of the country’s newsrooms by The Canadian Press.
Continue reading Canadian Press criticized for “Newsmaker of the Year”
Jun Lin’s funeral to be held today
$70,000 raised for murder victim
Nearly two months after Jun Lin’s dismembered body was found in Montreal, a public funeral will be held for him on Thursday in a Montreal funeral home according to the National Post.
A public memorial was held last weekend when his mother spoke about how his death had devastated the family. “We still believe that most people here are very kind, but this heinous crime happened in Canada. It’s made me reconsider what kind of place this is,” Zhigui Du told CBC.
The funeral was announced by Concordia University, where Lin was studying computer science.
Concordia said last on Friday that $70,000 has been raised in Lin’s honour. His family is now setting up an award in his memory.
Jun Lin’s family speaks
“To his parents, he was a loving and considerate son.”
The family of Jun Lin, a Concordia University student and alleged murder victim of Luka Rocco Magnotta, has released this statement:
As Jun Lin’s family, we would first like to express our deepest appreciation to different levels of both the Chinese and Canadian governments, the related embassies and consulates, the Montreal police, Concordia University, the Chinese community and many other kind-hearted people for their good will and humanitarian support for us at this exceptionally difficult time. Through the kindness of many people, we were able to arrive in Montreal at the earliest possible time.
