A Toronto man unlawfully caused the death of his parents and attempted to kill his brother in Etobicoke in September 2022, an Ontario judge has ruled.
Supreme Court Justice John Barrett delivered her decision Thursday at Alpha Henry's solitary hearing in a Toronto courtroom.
Henry is charged with two counts of second-degree murder in the attempted murders of his parents, Colin Henry, 68, and Veronica Henry, 67, and his brother, Daniel Kwame Henry.
But Barrett stopped short of finding Henry guilty on Thursday, as his defense team indicated in November that it planned to file a motion to declare him not criminally responsible on the grounds of mental illness if the court finds he committed unlawful acts.
Barrett said in her cause that she completely rejects the defense's evidence presented at trial.
“I do not believe the defendant's account that Daniel assaulted her and her parents,” the judge wrote. “I reject her evidence in its entirety. The defendant's account is inconsistent with logic and common sense.”
On September 21, 2022, at approximately 1:30 a.m., Toronto police were called to a unit in an apartment building near 27 Bergamot Ave., Islington Avenue and Rexdale Boulevard.
When they arrived, they found Henry's parents dead in their bathtub. Both were stabbed and doused with petrol.
Alpha Henry was arrested nearby after her younger brother, Daniel, called 911 from the gas station. The court heard Daniel went home after being out of the country and argued with his brother, before running off to try and get help.
Daniel was also arrested but released unconditionally the next day. Alpha charged later.
The evidence is overwhelming, the judge says
The Crown argued that Henry killed his parents in their apartment on September 19, 2022. The court heard that after a few weeks away from his family, Henry went home in the morning.
The Crown said evidence showed he used a knife to stab his parents between 11:30 a.m. and 12:20 a.m. Security footage showed him coming from the apartment in the days after his death.
The Crown also argued that he used his mother's key fob to enter and exit the building and used her mobile phone to obtain the services of an escort on the night his parents were killed. He was seen purchasing gas, which the Crown alleges he used to drown his parents' bodies after placing them in the bathtub in the apartment.
The judge said the evidence against Henry was overwhelming.
Raksha blamed her brother for the death of her parents
The defense argued that Henry did not commit the murder but that Daniels did. The court heard that Daniel lived in an apartment with his parents, worked as a flight attendant and was on a trip to Japan before his death.
After returning home on the morning of September 20 and meeting with friends, he went to his parents' house on September 21.
The Crown argued that Henry attacked Daniel with the knife as he walked through the door but that he was able to take the knife from him. Daniel then fled the apartment with a knife and called 911 from a nearby gas station.
Henry told police that his brother attacked him after Daniel stabbed his parents.
In the end, the judge determined that Henry committed the unlawful acts of murder and attempted murder.
The judge scheduled another court appearance for January 17. The defense will argue that Henry is not criminally responsible and will ask the judge to have Alpha Henry examined by a forensic psychiatrist.
