Thursday, January 17, 2013

Trial gets underway for Ethiopian man accused of stabbing ex-girlfriend 53 times

(Jan 13, 2013, By CHLOÉ FEDIO, Ottawa Citizen)--Tamrat Gebere was holding his crying 17-month-old daughter in his arms when he called 911 to report that he had stabbed her mother to death, an Ottawa court heard as Gebere’s second-degree murder trial got underway Wednesday.

Aster Kassa
“Hello. I killed my girlfriend,” Gebere told the dispatcher, sobbing between words. “I killed her. Sorry. Sorry.” Gebere tried to hush his daughter’s cries as the dispatcher asked whether 32-year-old Aster Kassa was still breathing.

“I miss Mommy,” he repeated over and over, refusing to go back into the bedroom where Kassa lay dead, stabbed 53 times. Gebere, 37, sat slouched in the prisoner’s box with his face in his hands as the jury listened to the recording of the 911 call. He has pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of manslaughter.

Kassa left Gebere more than a year before she was killed, Crown prosecutor Lia Bramwell told the jury during her opening statement. Mother and daughter bounced from one shelter to the next before moving to a two-bedroom apartment on Riverside Drive in July 2010.

“One can only imagine the anticipation and hope that Aster felt as she and her young child left the shelter for their new home — a place they could call their own,” Bramwell said. “That hope for a better future crashed to an abrupt halt just 18 hours later.” Read more from Ottawa Citizen »

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