Skip to content

Defence wants less time for mom who smothered son

CALGARY — The defence says an abusive childhood reduces the moral culpability of a woman who confessed in her diary to killing her infant son.

CALGARY — The defence says an abusive childhood reduces the moral culpability of a woman who confessed in her diary to killing her infant son.

Stacey Joy Bourdeaux, 34, pleaded guilty last summer to manslaughter in the death of 10-month-old Sean Ronald Fewer in 2004 and to the attempted murder of her five-year-old six years later. She also admitted to failing to provide the necessities of life.

Bourdeaux admitted in her diary to both attacks in messages to her husband Ted Fewer, who had died a few years earlier in an electrical accident.

“Dear Ted. Now that you are gone I can confess about Sean,” Bourdeaux wrote. “The night that he left us, it wasn’t actually while he was sleeping.

“I did what I didn’t want to do. The crying wouldn’t stop, so I ended up putting a pillow over his face and made sure that it was stopping his breathing. I know it’s something that I shouldn’t have done, but I did.”

Defence lawyer Katherin Beyak says Bourdeaux deserves a sentence in the eight- to 10-year range and not the 18 years that the Crown is demanding. While the Crown has pointed to the journal entries as aggravating factors, Beyak told court Monday that the entries did show signs of remorse.

“When she said she knew it was something she shouldn’t have done I would view that as an expression of remorse,” said Beyak.

“She’s retrospectively looking back at what she did.”

Beyak said Bourdeaux was both physically and sexually abused as a child and received virtually no counselling. That in turn hurt her ability to cope with stressful situations — all “provocative” factors in the death of the infant who was ill and constantly crying.

“The court has circumstances before it that mitigate the gravity of the offence.”

Justice Terry Semenuk said Beyak had not provided him any previous cases for sentencing in which there was a long time period between the death of one child and a serious injury to another.

“It may be a significant factor in terms of raising the sentence in this case,” he warned.

“Had it (the death) come to light at the time of the offence, there’s no question this accused would have been dealing with child and welfare services,” Semenuk added.

“Without speculation ... the circumstances of the attempted murder may not have happened.”

Sean was found not breathing in his crib in December 2004. At the time, his death did not raise any suspicion with the medical examiner, who ruled it was a case of sudden infant death syndrome.

In May 2010, police were called to Alberta Children’s Hospital in Calgary where a five-year-old boy was brought in with breathing trouble.

A few months later, police charged Bourdeaux with attempted murder and choking with intent. They looked into her background and that’s when they discovered Sean’s death.

The attack on her five-year-old came after her husband was already gone. The Crown concedes that Bourdeaux was going through a serious depression.