Annual review for man who beheaded a fellow bus passenger
Posted May 14, 2012 6:08 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A review board may be asked Monday to grant more freedom to a man who beheaded a fellow passenger on a Greyhound bus along a highway in rural Manitoba.
Vince Li was found not criminally responsible for stabbing and decapitating Tim McLean in July, 2008, near Portage la Prairie.
Li was sentenced to a mental hospital in Selkirk, Man., and was initially kept inside the locked wing.
But after an annual review of his treatment in 2010, Li started being granted short, supervised walks on the hospital grounds.
Last year, the Criminal Code Review Board decided to gradually increase those walks to several hours.
Li’s conditions are up for review again and the board is expected to hear psychiatric testimony about whether his schizophrenia is improving.
The victim’s mother, Carol DeDelley, has opposed granting more freedom to Li, saying he should be kept behind locked doors for the rest of his life.
But psychiatrist Steven Kremer told the board in previous years that Li has responded to treatment and was being co-operative, even though he continued to have auditory hallucinations.
Kremer told the review board last year that Li could eventually merit escorted trips off the hospital grounds and into Selkirk.
Li’s trial was told he was an untreated schizophrenic who heard voices telling him to kill McLean, a young carnival worker who Li had never met before. Passengers said Li started stabbing McLean in an unprovoked attack.
After the driver stopped the bus and the passengers exited, Li decapitated McLean and ate pieces of his flesh.
The Crown has opposed some of the previous recommendations to give Li more freedom. Last year, Crown attorney Susan Helenchilde said Li should only be allowed to walk the hospital grounds during daylight hours and only when at least two staff members are with him.
The review board ruled that Li only needed to be escorted by one staff member, as long as that worker has a cellphone or two-way radio.
Li, 44, emigrated from China in 2001 and worked menial jobs in Winnipeg. He moved to Edmonton in 2006 and was on his way back to Winnipeg when he killed McLean.
