A man trying to have his conviction overturned in the 2007 Surrey Six slayings learned July 22 in B.C. Supreme Court in New Westminster that his application to block the Crown from using 210 hours of security footage taken at the medical isolation unit of Surrey Pre-trial Services Centre has been dismissed.
Cody Rae Haevischer is seeking a judicial stay of proceedings based on abuse of process. The evidentiary hearing for that commenced on Nov. 4, 2024 and remains underway.
"I am satisfied on the submissions of Crown counsel that the footage may be probative of live issues in this case," Justice Martha Devlin ruled in this application related to 14 videos of footage recorded from June 4 to 17, 2009. "I am also satisfied that the prejudicial effect of permitting the Crown to rely on the footage is not so severe that they ought to be prohibited from doing so."
Six people were shot dead in suite 1505 of the Balmoral Tower in Whalley on Oct. 19, 2007. The Crown's theory was that the killings were payback for an unpaid debt between rival gangs. Christopher Mohan and Abbotsford gasfitter Ed Shellenberg, 55, were innocent victims who accidentally stumbled upon a drug hit in progress.
Edward Sousakhone Narong, 22, Ryan Bartolomeo, 19, and brothers Michael Justin Lal, 26, and Corey Jason Michael Lal, 21, were also slain.
Meantime, on Feb. 20, 2025 Devlin also denied Haevischer's application for his legal counsel to cross-examine nine defence witnesses, finding it to be "premature."
Devlin noted that in the stay application Haevischer alleges police, Crown and Corrections officials "engaged in various forms of misconduct during the investigation and prosecution of the Surrey Six murders" and that these allegations primarily relate to "a broad strategy adopted by investigators aimed at shifting the loyalties of Mr. Haevischer’s criminal associates, including the girlfriends of these associates, to the police."
The British Columbia Court of Appeal upheld Haevisher's murder conviction in January 2021.
