NEW WESTMINSTER, B.C. — A hearing begins today in B.C. Supreme Court to determine whether strict new controls should be placed on a mentally ill father who killed his three children eight years ago.
Crown lawyers are seeking to have Allan Schoenborn designated as a "high-risk accused," a controversial label that was created by the former Conservative government.
The Criminal Code designation includes provisions that can stop almost all of his absences from a psychiatric hospital and has the potential to extend annual review hearings to once every three years.
Schoenborn's lawyers object to the label and plan to argue it's unconstitutional at a future hearing, while the family of the victims is strongly in favour of the harsher designation.
The hearing comes just ahead of Schoenborn's annual hearing before the B.C. Review Board, which last year granted the man escorted day passes into the community.
In 2010 Schoenborn was found not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder for the slayings of his 10-year-old daughter and eight- and five-year-old sons in their Merritt, B.C., home.
