Victim upset accused attacker avoiding justice

By Hannah Spray, The Starphoenix: Dayton Marble holds up pictures his wife took of him after he was assaulted while on the job as a security guard at a Social Services office. Photograph by: Richard Marjan, The Starphoenix , The Starphoenix

   A man who was attacked while working security at a Social Services office is alarmed that more than a year later, his attacker appears to have left the province and is not facing justice.
   On April 8, 2014, Dayton Marble noticed a client at the Social Services office in downtown Saskatoon getting upset with the employees at reception. Marble said he approached the man and asked him to settle down.
   "He didn't, so I told him he'd have to leave. The next thing I know he was in my face, yelling at me that I'd killed all his Muslim brothers in Somalia and Afghanistan," Marble said. The next moment, the man had a chair over his head and the next thing Marble remembers is being down on the ground, fighting.
   Marble, 58, suffered numerous injuries, including three rotator cuff tears and a shredded bicep tendon. He was off work for 11 months. While he still works for the same private security company, he is not stationed at Social Services anymore.
   Hady Abdul Mohamed was charged with assault causing bodily harm and uttering threats.
His case was directed into the mental health strategy at Saskatoon provincial court, but after being given a month to see a psychiatrist, Mohamed failed to show up for a June 2014 court appearance. A bench warrant for his arrest is still outstanding.
   Marble, who's been told Mohamed is in British Columbia, said he has reached out to police, prosecutors, provincial and federal government officials, but feels that all he gets is the runaround. Due to Mohamed's refugee status, there are many layers of government involved, and each response Marble gets to his inquiries points to someone else he should be talking to, as evidenced in the correspondence he's kept.
   He did get some answers from the provincial Crown, although it wasn't what he wanted to hear. Marble shared an email he received from Daryl Rayner, executive director of public prosecutions in Saskatchewan, which said the Crown would not extend the arrest warrant to B.C., nor request Mohamed be held in custody if he's arrested.
   "The prosecutors will instruct the police that if Mr. Mohamed is arrested in a jurisdiction outside Saskatchewan, he should be released to appear back in Saskatoon on a specified date," Rayner wrote. "Given the nature of the charges and the accused, we will not extend the warrant to British Columbia to have him arrested and returned in custody."
   A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice said he couldn't comment on the specific case.
"People who receive a second chance to appear on their own in a Saskatchewan court - after being found by officers in another police jurisdiction, for example - but who choose not to attend can expect a different result next time, as well as at least one further criminal charge and proportionate consequence," Jordan Jackle said in an emailed statement.
   Marble said he doesn't understand how someone who's charged with a crime is just allowed to leave the province and, presumably, continue accessing government services in another one.
   "I was born in this country. I served in the military, and I feel like a second-class citizen, the way the government's handling this," Marble said. "How can a person like that be allowed to basically roam around the country with no consequences?" hspray@thestarphoenix.com 

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