When Maple Batalia’s family moved to Canada when she was just five months old, they had no idea what her tragic fate would be.
The up-and-coming model, actress and health sciences SFU student was shot and killed in a parking lot outside her school by her ex-boyfriend in September of 2011.
It would be a year before anyone was arrested for her murder. And now, more than five years later, the court system is about to finish handing out justice.
Maple’s killer and ex-boyfriend, Gurjinder Dhaliwal, received a life sentence last March after being convicted of second-degree murder. He was given no chance of parole for 21 years.
But Gursimar Bedi, the co-accused in her murder who has been described as the “eyes and ears” of the man convicted of her murder, has been found guilty of accessory to murder after the fact despite initially facing a charge of manslaughter.
Bedi is set to be sentenced on Friday (Jan. 27).
This second – and final – sentencing in New Westminster will be the end of a long court journey for the family.
“This case has been postponed millions of times,” Maple’s sister Roselyn told the Now over the phone from California.
“(My parents) have suffered depression… My dad is underweight and doesn’t sleep. He’s always saying, ‘Why couldn’t I protect my little girl?’ He blames himself,” she said. “My mom has lost all hope. She’s doing all these things, raising money, trying to find her daughter in doing these things. And at the end of the day she’s not coming back.
“They still have all her clothes.”
Roseleen isn’t sure how she’ll feel after the final sentence is handed down on Friday.
“I have mixed emotions,” she said. “One side it’s going to heal, but in the end, what does this outcome really do? We waited five years for what? My sister is never going to come home.”
The length of the sentence, however, is of extreme importance.
“It means a lot to me.”
Raising awareness about intimate partner violence (IPV), particularly in the South Asian community, is also important to Roseleen.
“Raising awareness, stopping victim blaming, educating our community and others on this problem has been our number one priority,” she said of her family.
“We don’t get anything out of the community stuff we have done, only the satisfaction that we get from helping to stop another family from going through what we have.
“I’ve been involved in community projects related to different realities that South Asian women face in B.C. and we’ve already lost so many women to domestic violence.”
A report from BC Coroner’s Service Death Review Panel, titled A Review of Intimate Partner Violence Deaths 2010-2015, notes that an average of 12 people die each year in B.C. as a result of injuries from an intimate partner and that women continue to be murdered at a rate four times greater than men victims of IPV.
As well, women made up more than 83 per cent of murders that occurred as a result of IPV.
And between 2003 and 2013, there were 960 intimate partner homicides in the country – an average of 87 deaths per year.
Azarria Khan of Surrey Women’s Centre noted that in cases that have come through that facility, they’ve found the court system focuses more on rehabilitating offenders than deterrence.
“The courts need to send a message that crimes will not be tolerated in our society,” said Khan, “and should focus a little more on deterrence, but still keep the rehabilitation factor in place.
“The onus is on the Crown to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the crime did occur. The issue is that the standard of proving beyond a reasonable doubt is very high in the criminal justice system,” Khan added.
With file from Vancouver Sun
