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British Columbia’s premier says the province has worked with the federal government to change bail rules, so he’s not sure why a man with a long history of violent crime was released from jail just weeks before a woman was stabbed to death in her Surrey, B.C., home.
David Eby called the murder “heinous” and said reformed federal regulations should have prevented Adam Mann from being released.
The 40-year-old man has been arrested and charged with second-degree murder in the death last month of Tori Dunn, 30, who’s family said stemmed from a home invasion.
Dunn’s family has launched a petition calling for a legal review of the circumstances that led to Mann’s release and “reforms to the system to prevent similar tragedies in the future”.
The petition was launched on July 3 and had collected nearly 2,200 signatures as of Tuesday.
Eby said he has asked his team to reach out to the Dunn family to discuss the case to better understand the issues and find ways to “support the Dunn family in their call for further federal reform.”
“This should never have happened,” Eby said Tuesday.
He added of the bail rule: “It’s horrific and understanding why it didn’t work in Dunn’s case will help us protect other families in the future.”
Mann, an Ontario resident, was found by Surrey police in critical condition on June 16 while on her way to Dunn’s home, the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team said in a statement last month.
At the time, Mann was facing an unrelated aggravated assault charge stemming from an attack in Surrey three weeks earlier.
He was convicted of a home invasion robbery in Ontario more than a decade ago and was deemed an “unmanageable risk” and unsuitable for community supervision in a pre-sentencing report.
Court records in British Columbia, Ontario and New Brunswick show Mann has a decades-long criminal history.
The charges against Mann in connection with Tori Dunn’s death have not yet been heard in court, and he is expected to appear in court again on July 19.
In 2009, he was sentenced to 12 years in prison for burglary and weapons possession, but he lost his appeal.
The Ontario Court of Appeal’s 2010 ruling said Mann had committed 22 crimes before he was 25, including violent crimes involving firearms and robbery.
The ruling said pre-sentence reports on Mann, who once described stabbing a female victim as “like a knife cutting through butter”, were “very pessimistic”.
The report states that Mann is “not suitable for community supervision as he appears to be an unmanageable risk in the community.”
In December 2014, Mann was convicted of assault for spitting at two employees of the Atlantic Institute in Reynolds, New Brunswick, where he was being held.
Online court records from British Columbia show Mann also has a lengthy criminal history in that province.
In 2021, he was convicted of publishing an intimate photo without consent, which occurred in Abbotsford.
In March, Mann was found guilty of possessing a dangerous weapon and intentionally resisting or obstructing a sheriff’s office. On June 5, he was found guilty of violating his probation.
Eby previously said Mann’s release raised questions because he was facing criminal charges and prosecutors had urged the judge not to release him back into society.
British Columbia Justice Minister Niki Sharma said in a statement on June 28 that the government will “investigate this matter and advocate with Ottawa to ensure that the federal criminal code meets public safety needs.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published on July 9, 2024.
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