MOOSE JAW — With drugs and $17,000 worth of cash in hand, drug dealer Mahamed Bashir Farah visited an apartment suite where two other dealers waited, wanting to combine their operations with his.
While Farah was friends with one man, he did not want to join forces with them since he did not like the third dealer. After learning about Farah’s hesitation, the third man attacked him, took his keys and left to steal any drugs or cash from his apartment, leaving the second man to guard Farah with a gun.
Eventually, the Somali-born Canadian wrestled the gun away from his friend, shot him, and fled.
Police arrived and arrested Farah, charging him with attempted murder, tampering with the serial number on the gun, possession of a prohibited or restricted firearm with ammunition, unauthorized possession of a firearm, possession of a weapon for dangerous purposes and breach of probation.
So, is what Farah did an act of attempted murder or one of self-defence?
That’s the question that Justice Catherine Dawson answered in Court of King’s Bench on Aug. 6. She spent 90 minutes reading out her 60-page decision, which was based on testimony and arguments she heard during a trial held months ago.
Case facts
The incident occurred on July 5, 2022, at an apartment on the 200 block of High Street East, with police and firefighters arriving around 11:58 p.m. to find Farah, 36, sitting downstairs with the gun beside him, Justice Dawson said.
“Mr. Farah admits that … he shot (the victim), once in the abdomen and once in the face with a firearm, specifically, a loaded 9-millimetre Sig Sauer semi-automatic pistol,” she continued, noting Farah “spontaneously” told police without being asked.
While one officer arrested him, another went to the sixth-floor suite and found the victim sitting on the toilet covered in blood, while there were puddles of blood covering the apartment floors. The man was also holding a “wad of cash” in one hand and had another between his legs — which he was using to hide a bag of drugs.
The man had two gunshot wounds: one bullet entered his face, exited his neck, and fractured his jaw, while a second bullet entered his abdomen and caused “superficial” damage.
EMS took the man to the hospital in Moose Jaw with “non-life-threatening” injuries before transporting him to Regina. Meanwhile, he refused to tell officers what happened, but they had a good idea of what happened since there was drug-trade paraphernalia everywhere.
The judge noted that Farah and the victim became friends in 2019, while in 2022, the Somali-born Canadian became involved in the drug trade. The man eventually decided that he wanted nothing more to do with his friend since the latter had become loyal to the third man.
However, on that July night, the friend and third drug dealer confronted him about joining forces.
After the third dealer took his money, drugs and keys, the friend stayed to guard Farah. Farah pleaded to be released — he knew he would be tortured if the third dealer returned — but was refused. While sitting across from each other, Farah saw his chance to seize the gun after his friend put it down to grab a pipe.
They struggled briefly before Farah gained control and shot the man, and during the trial, he testified that he only intended to shoot the man in the thigh and then flee, while he only remembered one gunshot, Justice Dawson said.
Guilty or not guilty?
Justice Dawson said that after assessing the evidence, she considered Farah to be “credible and reliable,” noting he remembered the evening with clarity and gave “inherently plausible” testimony that matched what police found at the scene. Moreover, he testified that he didn’t want to shoot his friend but only did so to escape.
To convict Farah of attempted murder, the Crown had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he fired the gun at his friend and that he meant to kill the man, the judge continued.
While she was fully satisfied with the first element, she thought the Crown had failed to prove that Farah intended to kill his fellow drug dealer. Therefore, the accused was not guilty of attempted murder.
Meanwhile, Justice Dawson looked at whether the Crown had proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Farah did not act in self-defence. She noted that three elements contribute to the self-defence claim: the force used, the act’s motive and the response’s reasonableness.
Farah had “reasonable grounds” to believe that the two drug dealers would use force — violence — against him, she said. Secondly, his motive for using the gun was to defend himself and escape. Therefore, the Crown failed to prove both conditions beyond a reasonable doubt.
With Farah’s overall response, Justice Dawson looked at several variables that the Supreme Court had considered in similar self-defence situations. While she had concerns about Farah shooting the second man, she also had to consider how any other “reasonable person” would respond to unlawful confinement.
“Based on … the totality of the evidence, I am left in doubt that self-defence does not apply. In that respect, the Crown has failed to demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Farah’s conduct was unreasonable in the circumstances,” the judge said.
Therefore, Farah was not guilty of attempted murder, aggravated assault and assault with a weapon, she added. She then ordered his release, which occurred on Aug. 7.
