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Samra jailed for life in two killings; Gary Oakes TORONTO STAR. Toronto Star. Toronto, Ont.: Dec 17, 1993. Sec. B. pg. A.1
Kuldip Singh Samra was sentenced to life imprisonment with no chance of parole for at least 25 years today in the killing of two men and the wounding of a third in a Toronto courtroom a decade ago.
A woman in the courtroom began sobbing as the jurors returned their guilty verdicts after deliberating for nearly 13 hours over two days.
They found Samra, 47, guilty of two counts of first- degree murder and one of attempted murder as a result of a shooting in Osgoode Hall on March 18, 1982.
Oscar Fonseca and Bhupinder Pannu were killed in the shooting and Amarjit Tatla was left permanently paralyzed.
The shootings took place immediately after a judge ruled against Samra in a civil case arising from a dispute over elections for a Sikh temple.
Tatla and Pannu were on the other side of the dispute and Fonseca was their lawyer.
After the shootings, Samra fled to India, where he was eventually arrested.
He was later returned to Canada for his 10-week trial.
Prosecutor Uriel Priwes told the jurors the motive for the shootings was revenge against Samra's "mortal enemies" - those who stood in his way.
Priwes said Samra had "undying hatred" for those who opposed him and when the judge's ruling went against him, he "turned a courtroom into a shooting gallery . . . a charnel house."
The prosecutor said the shootings amounted to Samra saying to his enemies, "Damn you and damn your lawyer."
Samra's legal adviser, Munyonzwe Hamalengwa, had argued that Samra was in a deep depression at the time and actually intended to kill himself in the courtroom.
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Last Modified: August 11, 2007
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