In the news today, Feb. 5

A sentencing hearing continues today for Bruce McArthur, a serial killer who preyed on men from Toronto’s gay village for years before he was arrested. Friends and relatives of McArthur’s eight victims are expected to continue reading their victim impact statements. Many wept in court Monday as prosecutors provided previously unheard details of the killings, which took place between 2010 and 2017. Police arrested McArthur in January 2018. He pleaded guilty last week to eight counts of first-degree murder.

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THREE WORKERS DIE IN CANADIAN PACIFIC DERAILMENT

Officials with the Transportation Safety Board will provide a briefing in Calgary this morning on the train derailment near Field, B.C., that killed three Canadian Pacific crew members. The westbound Canadian Pacific freight jumped the tracks early Monday, and a union representative says it fell more than 60 metres from a bridge and into the Kicking Horse River. The railway says in a statement that conductor Dylan Paradis, engineer Andrew Dockrell and trainee Daniel Waldenberger-Bulmer were killed in the derailment. The union said the crew was based out of Calgary.

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SAGMOEN PLEADS GUILTY TO ASSAULT AGAINST WOMAN

A man who faces a series of charges including alleged assaults of escorts in British Columbia’s North Okanagan has pleaded guilty to assault in an unrelated incident involving a sex worker in Maple Ridge in 2013. Curtis Wayne Sagmoen was initially charged with assault causing bodily harm but pleaded guilty to the lesser charge Monday in provincial court in Port Coquitlam. The trial was scheduled for five days but was shortened to a day when Crown prosecutor Juan O’Quinn and defence lawyer Lisa Jean Helps made a joint submission agreeing to the guilty plea on the lesser charge and a recommended sentence.

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ALBERTA HONOURS FORMER PREMIER JIM PRENTICE

Jim Prentice, the last premier of Alberta’s 44-year Progressive Conservative dynasty, was honoured Monday as a man of courage and vision — and one who couldn’t resist meeting with school tours when they passed by his office. Prentice died in October 2016, at age 60, when the light plane he was in crashed in the lake country just outside Kelowna, B.C. He was Alberta’s 16th premier, taking over in September of 2014 but losing to Premier Rachel Notley and her NDP in the May 2015 election. Notley recalled Prentice as a man committed to alleviating child poverty and honouring the promise of reconciliation with Indigenous peoples.

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ALSO IN THE NEWS:

— Quadriga, Canada’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, is due in court today as it seeks creditor protection in the wake of the sudden death of its founder and CEO in December, and missing cryptocurrency worth roughly $190 million.

— Sgt. Paul Gauthier appears at the Toronto Police Disciplinary Hearings Office on charges of insubordination and neglect of duty.

— A preliminary inquiry continues in the case of Bassam Al-Rawi, a former Halifax taxi driver accused of a 2012 sexual assault.

— WestJet releases its fourth-quarter results before markets open and will hold a conference call with analysts.

The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

In the news today, Feb. 5

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