PORT HAWKESBURY, N.S. — A Cape Breton man was dragged out to sea with a gaff and tied to an aluminum anchor after he was shot and his boat was rammed three times, the Crown said as a murder trial got underway Thursday.
Prosecutor Steve Drake delivered his opening arguments at the second-degree murder trial of Joseph James Landry, who has pleaded not guilty in the death last year of Phillip Boudreau.
Drake told a jury that Boudreau, 43, died as the result of a sustained attack by a three-man crew including Landry of a lobster boat called the Twin Maggies.
“This case is about murder for lobster”, Drake said before the Nova Scotia Supreme Court.
“It’s not about a loss of control. The crew of the Twin Maggies carried out a sustained attack.”
Drake said the Twin Maggies rammed Boudreau’s boat three times at the mouth of Petit de Grat harbour on June 1, 2013. He said Landry fired four shots from a rifle, one of which hit Boudreau’s leg.
Boudreau’s boat overturned after it was rammed the third time and he was then hooked with a gaffe and dragged out to sea, Drake said.
“You will hear through witnesses Landry using his own words, ’Get him ... Kill him,”’ he told the court.
Landry, 67, is one of four people charged in the case.