Brian Douglas Jensen, 59, used a hammer and bar to interrupt 70 panels of glass on the enduring bridge final July.
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Homeless Calgarian Brian Douglas Jensen was “indignant on the world” when he smashed dozens of panes of glass on town’s iconic Peace Bridge, his lawyer advised court docket Monday.
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Protection lawyer Adriano Iovinelli stated Jensen had lived on the streets for years and was annoyed that the system did nothing to help him.
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“He cannot get housing, he cannot get meals on sure days … and he is strolling on a $25-million construction constructed by town of Calgary,” Iovinelli advised Provincial Courtroom Choose Margaret Keelaghan stated.
“Think about being advised there are not any assets after which strolling on a $25 million bridge,” the lawyer stated, including that he was not excusing Jensen’s conduct, however merely explaining it.
“He was indignant on the world, he was indignant on the metropolis, he was indignant at his life-style, he was simply indignant.”
Jensen, 59, pleaded responsible to a single rely of mischief inflicting property injury for 2 separate incidents during which he vandalized the pedestrian bridge connecting downtown Calgary and the neighborhood of Sunnyside.
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Opened in March 2012, the bridge is the $24.5 million creation of Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava and is likely one of the metropolis’s favourite locations.
Crown prosecutor Robert Marquette stated Jensen first broken the bridge on June 18 when he used a picket stake, or dowel, to interrupt a single pane of glass, inflicting about $12,000 in injury.
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Simply over a month later, on July 24, Jensen returned to the identical location and, armed with a hammer and rebar, smashed 70 further panes of glass, Marquette advised Keelaghan.
The prosecutor offered the decide with a restitution request from town asking for $1,036,389.60 from the homeless man.
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However Iovinelli stated Jensen would not have the means to pay something, noting that video of the July 24 incident reveals his consumer not solely smashing glass home windows but additionally throwing his few worldly items from the buying cart he was carrying pressed on the bridge.
“My consumer would not have a nickel to his identify,” the lawyer stated.
Marquette recommended Keelaghan Jensen, who has a prolonged prior document, hand over the equal of a yr in jail, mentioning that he could not discover comparable pricey acts of vandalism that weren’t dedicated for issues like insurance coverage fraud, political statements or revenge not.
However Iovinelli argued his consumer, who spent six months in custody, which with enhanced credit score quantities to a nine-month time period, had spent sufficient time behind bars.
On Friday, Keelaghan will determine what sentence matches each the crime and the offender.
KMartin@postmedia.com
On Twitter: @KMartinCourts
