InteriorNEWS THE
108th Year - Week 40
•
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
•
www.interior-news.com
•
PM 40007014
$1.30 (gst included)
Smithers voters converge on the St. Joseph’s School voting station on Monday to help determine the outcome of one of Canada’s longest federal election campaigns. Story, A3. Alicia Bridges photo
Houston pair sentenced Jury finds boyfriend for animal cruelty crimes guilty of murder By Alicia Bridges Smithers/Interior News
A Houston mother and daughter were banned from owning animals for 20 years as punishment for animal cruelty offences in a sentence handed down by the Smithers Provincial Court last week. Karin Adams, aged 43, and her 22-year-old daughter Catherine were sentenced last Thursday after entering guilty pleas the previous day. Karin, who appeared via video-link, pleaded guilty to two counts of causing or permitting an animal to be in distress. Catherine Adams also pleaded guilty to two counts of causing or permitting an animal to be in distress, as well as one count of causing unnecessary pain or suffering to an animal. The charges relate to their treatment of 53 horses, dogs, cats, fish and birds, which were seized from their property near Houston by the BCSPCA last
year. Emaciated horses and dogs kept in small, filthy cages were among the animals removed from the property where the Adams’s were living near Houston. Animal welfare officers also found dogs with parasite infections, dental problems and medical conditions which had not received adequate treatment. The BCSPCA first visited the Adams’ property near Houston in April 2014 after receiving anonymous tips from the public. They issued two orders demanding the women improve their care for the animals, once in April and again June, before executing the search warrant at the property on Aug. 28, 2014. The RCMP laid charges in February, 2015 and the Adams’s pleaded not guilty in April, however they changing their pleas to guilty in court on Tuesday. See BAN on A5
Kamloops This Week
A jury deliberated last Wednesday for just five hours before finding the 24-year-old boyfriend of CJ Fowler guilty of murder in her December 2012 death in Kamloops. The 11 jurors found Damien Taylor guilty of second-degree murder, which carries with it a life sentence. They did not recommend a minimum time that Taylor must serve in jail before he may be paroled, something that will be decided later by B.C. Supreme Court Justice Dev Dley after a sentencing hearing. The 16-year-old girl was found dead in the Guerin Creek area on
Dec. 12, 2012, with a concrete chunk on her chest. A pathologist testified she choked to death when her tongue became trapped in her airway, the result of at least one blow to her head and face. “I want to scream so loud and cry at the same time,” Matilda Fowler, CJ’s mother told reporters outside the Kamloops courthouse following the verdict. “I just don’t want any other mothers going through what I went through. I want to find answers for the other missing and murdered women, but I don’t know how to do that. I know a lot of them are missing their daughters and have no answers. I have answers and he’s going to jail.” See METH on A4
SKATEPARK PLAN RAMPS UP Local skaters volunteer time and ideas for skatepark expansion.
WHAT’S COOKING AT OKTOBERCHEF? Chefs test their skills in public cook-off to raise funds for social enterpise.
MADII LII PLANS LEGAL ACTION Gitxsan house group prepares to take the B.C. government to court.
SPORTS/A8
OUR TOWN/A19
THREE RIVERS/A27
Friday Only!
Value Priced Toilet Paper see last page in A
By Cam Fortems
Double Roll 24 roll
6
$
99