Through a combination of butchery and suffocation, Allan Schoenborn murdered his three little children in Merritt, traumatizing an entire community and forcing the entire province to ponder a horror.
Had the judge found him sane, the 41-year-old would have spent at least 25 years behind bars, and perhaps the rest of his life.
But the judge found him not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder.
So the duration of his confinement is a question mark. Some people are appalled at the verdict, since it carries an indefinite sentence and the punishment doesn't appear to fit such a horrific crime. However long Schoenborn remains in a secure psychiatric hospital, it won't be long enough.
But 25 years to life wouldn't be long enough to make up for what he did either.
Schoenborn will be held in a hospital where a three-person panel -- a judge, a doctor and a mental health worker -- will review his case and undoubtedly order him confined.
Every year, the board will hold a hearing on his status. The hearings are usually open to the public.
Justice Robert Powers remarked during sentencing that he agreed with one of the psychiatrists who testified Schoenborn "will be almost impossible to treat."
Schoenborn is extremely self-absorbed and self-centred, said the judge. He lacks insight into himself and his illness and tries to downplay or disguise it, which makes him risky to handle.
"I suspect it will be extremely difficult to treat and know whether his illness is actually under control or whether he is merely suppressing the symptoms," said the judge.
The verdict's exhaustive account of Schoenborn's behaviour in the months and years leading up to that day in April 2008 leaves the impression the judge made the right decision.
At 19, Schoenborn started having psychotic episodes in which he talked to Jesus and God and believed his girlfriend's father was a robot. He developed a minor criminal record but settled down after he met Darcie Clark, the slain children's mother.
When she told him she was pregnant with their first child, she did so in the presence of a mutual friend.
That became a fixation. He wondered if the friend was the father and his doubts about his spouse became an obsession. The obsession grew to encompass beliefs that she and her imaginary lovers were poisoning the children and abusing them.
Based on disgusting hallucinations and figments of his imagination, he lived in a perpetual state of agitated suspicion for years. He thought his spouse was using the children in the drug trade, ironic, given that he was drinking and smoking marijuana heavily throughout the period.
By 2007 he had full-blown symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia or delusional disorder, the two terms offered at trial. He heard voices constantly, thought there was a transmitter in his teeth, believed his phone was rigged and that his wife was controlled by drug lords.
Over the last two days of his children's lives he was an erratic, incoherent mess. He was in and out of their school making bizarre demands, getting arrested and demanding the arrest of others.
But tellingly, he would dial his behaviour down during crucial encounters with police, social workers, a bail supervisor and even his wife. He would appear just rational enough to allay concerns that he was completely out of control.
After he murdered the children on April 4, 2008, he tried to commit suicide with a razor blade, a cleaver and an electrical cord, but failed. So he ran away and was cornered 10 days later.
For all the concern about the verdict, one thing it does is focus attention on mental health treatment in B.C. Kaitlynne, Max and Cordon join a long list of victims who lost their lives when people close to them lost their minds. Not to excuse Schoenborn in the slightest, but it was noted at trial that his life was falling apart. He had no job, no income, no place to live, no driver's licence and was living with the knowledge his relationship was irrevocably over.
If anything at all good comes from this horror, it should be a renewed commitment to reach out to mentally ill people before they tip over the edge.
lleyne@tc.canwest.com
