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Your Independent Local Newspaper Established in 1918 VOLUME 104: ISSUE 20
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WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 19, 2022
Naslund sentence shortened, 18-year prison sentence slashed to nine MOUSH JOHN Editor
Holden resident, Helen Naslund, who had pleaded guilty in 2020 to manslaughter in the September 2011 death of her husband, Miles Naslund, and subseqently had been sentenced to a 18-year prison sentence in October that year, will now serve nine years. In a landmark decision last week, Alberta’s Court of Appeal has reduced her sentence to half. In a majority decision on Wednesday, Jan. 12, Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Sheila Greckol stated that the original 18-year sentence was harsh because it failed to consider Naslund’s abusive marriage, and she suggested that Alberta courts need to adjust their approach to cases similar to Naslund’s. In her decision, she wrote, “It is beyond time for this court to explicitly recognize that cases of battered women killing abusive partners involve
unique circumstances that must be considered by the sentencing judge, particularly where battered woman syndrome is involved.” Naslund had been abused by her husband Miles for close to three decades, without any reprieve, physically and mentally. She was accused of being disloyal, and had been threatened on multiple occasions with guns that her husband possessed. It was after another fit of rage when Miles had criticized the dinner that Helen had cooked, it reached a point of ‘no return’ for her. She shot her husband while he was sleeping, and with the help of her son, Neil, hid Miles’ body in a pond, a few miles away from the family farm in Holden. Miles was reported missing to the police, with Helen suggesting he had committed suicide. It was not until when her other son, Darrell, started speaking that the secret was discovered six years later,
and Helen pleading guilty to manslaughter in 2020. “The 18-year joint submission proposed by counsel and accepted by the sentencing judge in this case is so unhinged from the circumstances of the offence and the offender that its acceptance would lead reasonable and informed persons, aware of all the relevant circumstances . . . to believe that the proper functioning of the justice system had broken down,” wrote Justice Greckol in the decision released Wednesday. The Appeal Court said the sentencing judge didn’t properly consider the domestic abuse Ms. Naslund suffered over the 27-year marriage. The court imposed a nine-year sentence, minus time already served. Naslund’s appeal of the sentence argued that she feared for her safety, but didn’t want to leave the marriage out of concern for her children and because of her depression. A Facebook group
Helen Naslund seen here in the hospital with her newborn grandson. SUPPLIED PHOTO/WOMEN WHO CHOOSE TO LIVE FB PAGE)
called ‘Women Who Choose to Live’ had started a petition on Dec. 12, 2020 on change.org and it has received more than 26,000 signatures. Elizabeth Sheehy, a professor of emerita of law at the University of Ottawa and author of Defending Battered Women on Trial, and retired judge Lynn Ratushny, who conducted the Canadian Self Defence Review, which analyzed the cases of 98 Canadian women convicted of killing their abusive partners, wrote in the Edmonton Journal, dated
Dec. 10, 2020, why such an appeal was warranted, “As the window to appeal Helen Naslund’s guilty plea and sentence for killing her abusive husband closed this week, we see another woman’s life laid to waste by male violence and justice system failures. In March, she pled guilty to manslaughter and in October, she was sentenced by the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench to 18 years for her actions. Her case raises many questions, fuelling our serious concern that a grave
miscarriage of justice has occurred.” Defence lawyer Mona Duckett released a statement with Naslund’s reaction. “I am incredibly grateful to the justices who reduced my sentence and to the many people in Canada, and elsewhere, who supported me through this difficult experience,” she said. “I hope that other women can benefit from the court’s recognition of the terrible situation in which battered women find themselves.”