It will be a week before the couple charged in the killing of Saint Mary s University student Loretta Saunders find out if they will stand trial on charges of first-degree murder.
Blake Leggette, 26, and Victoria Henneberry, 28, were charged with Saunders killing on Feb. 27, two weeks after the 26-year-old Inuk woman disappeared from her Halifax apartment.
The Crown and defence lawyers for the pair made their final arguments Friday afternoon to wrap up a weeklong preliminary inquiry.
Now it is up to provincial court Judge Anne Derrick to decide whether there is sufficient evidence to send Leggette and Henneberry to trial. She is expected to deliver her decision Aug. 1.
Evidence from the hearing is banned from publication,
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Victoria Henneberry is escorted from a courtroom at Halifax provincial court Monday. She and her boyfriend, Blake Leggett, are charged with first-degree murder in the death of Loretta Saunders. (RYAN TAPLIN / Staff/ File)
Friday marked the first day that Saunders parents, Miriam and Clayton, were in the Halifax courtroom to face the couple charged with their daughter s death.
Saunders mother, sister and a brother had been kept out of the courtroom earlier in the week because they were subpoenaed on the behalf of Leggette s defence as potential witnesses. But Terry Sheppard, Leggette s lawyer, announced Thursday afternoon he no longer needed to hear their testimony.
Outside court Friday, Saunders sister, Delilah, spoke about what it meant to finally be allowed into the courtroom and to hear some of the evidence in the case.
My sister is the most important person in the world to me, the 22-year-old said.
It s pretty difficult being kept out of the process and being kept from details. It s been really, really difficult for our entire family.
Her brother James, 24, who was in court each day, hugged her as she spoke. He frequently broke down during the week s proceedings, at times sobbing and wailing.
It s time for healing now, he said.
Security was high at the outset of the hearing, but was stepped up even further after an uncle of Saunders lunged at the accused inside the courtroom Wednesday, the same day police received a report that someone had threatened to bring a gun to court.
The president don t have that much security around him. They are really well protected, James said.
Leggette and Henneberry were taken to and from court in a convoy that included unmarked police vehicles carrying officers dressed in tactical gear.
Large numbers of officers and sheriff s deputies patrolled the courthouse grounds and adjacent properties, including the historic cemetery next door, whenever the accused were entering or leaving the Spring Garden Road building.