Co-accused in 2021 drive-by killings to walk free because of trial delay

For the second time in his life an Ottawa man had a first-degree murder case falter before he ever got to trial because of problems in the management of the prosecutions against him.

Defence lawyers in a trial about an alleged drive-by bounty killing targeting three brothers in 2021 — which killed two of them — have successfully argued that the right to a trial in a timely fashion has been violated.

Abdullahi "Avon" Osman and his co-accused, Ahmed Siyad of Toronto, are set to walk out of the Ottawa Courthouse as free men later Friday after the ruling by Superior Court Justice Ian Carter.

"When the [trial] delay exceeds the presumptive ceiling and the Crown has failed to establish an exceptional circumstance, the court has no option," Carter told court.

"As the law stands now, the only available remedy is a stay of proceedings. As a result, that is the order that must be made in this case."

The right to a trial in a reasonable time is colloquially known in Canada as the Jordan principle, in honour of the case that helped establish appropriate timelines to get to trial. At the courthouse, it goes by 11(b).

Staying a charge stops or holds the legal process either temporarily or permanently.

Spring evening shooting

Osman and Siyad were each charged with two counts of first-degree murder and one of attempted murder in what CBC News exclusively reported was the targeted bounty killings of Abdulaziz Abdullah, 34, and Mohamad Abdullah, 27, the evening of May 28, 2021.

The two brothers were shot at a busy Alta Vista Drive strip mall parking lot. A third brother was also shot and survived.

Sources told CBC News at the time that the brothers had bounties on their heads following a hefty robbery of drugs and money in the Dominican Republic.

Investigators alleged Osman helped plan the shooting and that hired hands Siyad and Mohamed Shire, also from Toronto, carried it out. Shire remains wanted and at large.

Osman charged last decade

Osman was earlier accused of first-degree murder in the shooting death of 27-year-old Yusuf Ibrahim in 2015.

But a year later, the Crown stood up in court and asked for the charges against Osman and his co-accused Mohamed Abdi Abdullahi to be withdrawn.

The Ottawa Citizen reported at the time that the improper handling of a witness had prompted the chief of police to call for an investigation.

"Based on the Crown's ongoing assessment of the case, which included a careful and thorough review of the evidence and the applicable law, the Crown concluded that it was no longer viable to continue the prosecution and requested that the charges be withdrawn," a spokesperson for the Ministry of the Attorney General told CBC in 2016.

Trial was set to begin in March

On Friday, Osman and Siyad sat quietly in the prisoner's box as the judge was reading his decision, sometimes nodding their heads in agreement.

Osman and Siyad were originally scheduled to stand trial starting in June 2025, at which time the case was already in jeopardy of being tossed due to delay. Shortly before the trial began, evidence from two phones was found that had not been disclosed to the defence.

The June trial had to be cancelled and new dates were set starting in March this year, prompting defence counsel to ask for the stay of proceedings because of undue delay.

Osman was represented by Leora Shemesh, while Siyad was represented by Cydney Israel and Julianna Schiller.

The assistant Crown prosecutors on the file were James Cavanagh and Anne Fitzpatrick.