A 32-year-old Victoria man has been sentenced to life in prison for the 2017 execution-style murder of a man in Nanaimo.
Thirty-four-year-old Andrew McLean was shot and killed in the lobby of the Howard Johnson Hotel on Terminal Avenue in the early morning of April 19, 2017. In February of this year, Brandon Tyler Woody pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
Prosecutors told court that Woody killed McLean for “messing up” drug deals. Hotel surveillance showed Woody shooting McLean at close range, and then leaving through the front of the hotel.
Court heard that in a confession to police, Woody said he was ordered to kill McLean. The day of the murder, Woody first went to a south-end Nanaimo home looking for the victim. He forced a woman there to call McLean to find out where he was.
Woody then went to the hotel, where he found McLean.
The hotel’s video surveillance was played in court and captured what happened next. McLean was looking down at his cellphone as Woody entered the back of the lobby with his gun drawn. He shot McLean twice in the back and twice in the head at close range.
The night clerk was at the front desk and witnessed it all.
Before RCMP arrived at the murder scene, a nearby officer on patrol pulled over a vehicle that was being driven in a suspicious manner. The driver was Woody. The officer let Woody go when he was called to the murder scene, but police soon connected the dots and intercepted Woody near Duncan.
Woody later told police he gave the murder weapon to a man near the Duke Point turnoff. He said that man was wearing Hell’s Angels colours.
Woody will not be eligible for parole for 17 years. Twenty-five years is the maximum parole ineligibility period for a life sentence but it does not mean an inmate will automatically receive parole after 25 years.
