THUNDER BAY - Here are the top stories from February 2018, as selected by tbnewswatch.com editor Leith Dunick. We'll be rolling out our look back at the year gone throughout the rest of December, culminating with our most read stories of the year on Jan. 1.
- A pair of suspects was arrested and faced charges in conjunction with the city’s first murder of 2018, an incident that led to the death of a 28-year-old man at a Cumberland Street motel. Christopher Achneepineskum, 45, was charged with first-degree murder and a 36-year-old woman was charged with being an accessory after the fact to murder.
- Nicholas Necan was found guilty of second-degree murder in the January 2016 killing of George Gerard, a jury taking just two hours of deliberations before issuing its verdict.
- Fort William First Nation Chief Peter Collins urged the city to drop its legal battle with Canadian National Railway over the James Street Swing Bridge. Instead Collins asked the city to work with the First Nation on a replacement bridge over the Kaministiquia River that would cost $25 million. The situation would change again later in the year after a new court ruling in the city’s favour.
- Sixty-three-year-old Joseph Harry Pruys Sr. was killed and police began a city-wide search for Charles Norman Casmey, 31, who was wanted on a second-degree murder charge after a McLaughlin Street death. The suspect was later arrested at a McLauglin Street residence, three days after the killing.
- The trial of two University of Ottawa hockey players, Donovan Foucher and Guillaume Donovan, began in a Thunder Bay courtroom. They were accused of sexual assault after an incident that allegedly took place while their hockey team was in the city for a game against the Lakehead Thunderwolves. The verdict would be read in June.
- Sexual assault charges against embattled local lawyer Alexander (Sandy) Zaitzeff were dismissed when the lone witness failed to appear in court and Justice David Harris determined there was not enough evidence to find him guilty. Other charges of assault and sexual assault were heard in April.
- Local kingpin John Tsekouras had his appeal of drug trafficking charges denied by the Supreme Court, landing him behind bars to serve out his 9.5-year sentence. Tsekouras was arrested in 2012 during a police operation known as Project Dolphin.
- A Thunder Bay man died of carbon monoxide poisoning in an incident that could have been much worse. Firefighters decided not to wait for the all clear before breaking into a McTavish Street home, rescuing two women and a man who were also inside the residence at the time.
- A vigil was held at Hillcrest Park calling for justice in the wake of the verdict in the court case surrounding the death of Saskatchewan Indigenous man Colten Boushie. Farmer Gerald Stanley was acquitted of second-degree murder, claiming his gun went off accidentally and he feared for his life at the time of the killing. Students at the Bora Laskin School of Law also held a vigil later in the month.
- A wild lynx that attacked a Thunder Bay woman’s pet dog made headlines midway through the month. The 14-pound Maltipoo suffered a number of puncture wounds after the attack outside her Brookside Manor condominium.
