THUNDER BAY – A dark house and a “state of shock” would have made it difficult for Paulette Cloutier to be able to conclusively determine the identity of four men who broke into her house during a fatal home invasion.
That was the position of the defence during much of Wednesday’s proceedings at the Thunder Bay Courthouse during the second-degree murder trial against Shaldon Wabason, who was charged in the March 2011 death of 54-year-old Robert Topping.
Defence lawyer Delmar Doucette spent nearly two hours cross-examining Cloutier, who testified Tuesday afternoon she was alone in her son’s Minnesota Street home but called Topping for help after she suspected the house was about to be broken into shortly after midnight on March 19, 2011.
During the cross-examination, Cloutier told the court all of the interior lights of the home were turned off and the only light was from a television in the living room. While watching television she heard voices coming from the deck outside followed by banging on the door.
Doucette led Cloutier to recall the immediate seconds after the intruders broke into the home, where she was immediately forced to the ground with a knife held to her throat.
“I was very frightened for my life,” she said during her testimony, adding on multiple occasions she was in a state of shock during the altercation.
She told the court four men broke into the house with three involved in pinning her to the floor.
During her statements to police she said she was unable to provide any physical identifying characteristics of the one suspect who spent the most time around her but said she could describe his clothing.
Doucette referred to statements Cloutier made to police immediately following the home invasion and testimony given at a January 2012 preliminary inquiry. In those police statements Cloutier insisted all four men were of First Nations ethnicity, but said during the preliminary inquiry she was not sure about one of the four after police arrested and charged three First Nations and one Caucasian suspect.
He also extensively questioned Cloutier on her marijuana use earlier in the night prior to the break and enter.
Topping arrived at the residence after the break in and was stabbed during an altercation with the suspects, leading to his death shortly afterwards at the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre.
Wabason was one of four suspects arrested in connection, along with Nicholas Webber, Christopher Hawk and Cody Thompson. Webber pleaded guilty to manslaughter and in 2013 was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Hawk pleaded guilty to robbery in 2012 and had the murder charge dropped. In August 2011 Thompson was rushed from the district jail to hospital, where he died eight days later. The charges against him were withdrawn.
On Wednesday the court also heard from Dustin Cloutier, Paulette Cloutier’s son, who testified he had sold marijuana out of the home prior to the break and enter.
The trial, which is scheduled to last as long as three weeks and include testimony from 25 witnesses, will resume on Thursday.
