Note instructed lawyer to push button on recording device with bomb inside, attempted murder trial told

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A handwritten note within a mailed package urged a Winnipeg lawyer to push a button before an explosion shook her law office and took her right hand, a Winnipeg courtroom heard Tuesday.

That was just one of the messages police reconstructed from debris found at the sites of three mail explosions in the city more than two years ago.

The attempted murder trial of 51-year-old Guido Amsel began in earnest Tuesday morning as provincial court Judge Tracey Lord heard from the first witnesses called to the stand to support the Crown’s case.

Amsel is accused of mailing bombs targeting his ex-wife, her lawyer and his own lawyer following a bitter divorce proceeding. One of the bombs caused an explosion at Maria Mitousis’s River Avenue law office, severely injuring her. She had represented Amsel’s ex-wife, Iris, prior to the July 3, 2015 explosion. Two other explosive devices sent through the mail that weekend were safely detonated by police bomb units.

Amsel faces five counts of attempted murder and several explosives-related charges connected to the three packages, as well as a 2013 explosion at his ex-wife’s home. He pleaded not guilty to all of the charges and his defence lawyers have said he’s always maintained his innocence.

A note pieced together from scraps of lined, yellow paper that investigators found scattered around Mitousis’s office after the blast suggested the bomb was disguised as a recording device that had been mailed in a package addressed to the lawyer.

“Hi Maria,” the note said. “Push enter to start, listen to the conversation and phone me. Will help your defence.”

Winnipeg Police Service forensic identification officer Const. Brian Neumann testified he and other officers reconstructed the note after conducting a “hands-and-knees search” of Mitousis’s office, collecting every scrap of yellow paper they could find. Still, some parts of the note were missing and Neumann said he believed it also included partial digits of a phone number.

The note was believed to be included in the bubble-mailer package, along with a purple and orange pouch that contained crudely cut Styrofoam and later tested positive for a “clandestine” explosive substance, Neumann said, explaining officers also combed the office floor and ceiling tiles for fragments of metal, copper wire and pieces of button batteries.

The office was filled with “thousands” of potential pieces of evidence after the explosion, Neumann said.

“We collected everything that we believed to be related to this incident.”

How that evidence was handled is expected to be a key issue for Amsel’s defence lawyers Saheel Zaman and Jeremy Kostiuk. Neumann remained on the witness stand for most of the day under direct examination from Crown attorney Chris Vanderhooft and is set to return Wednesday as questioning continues.

Neumann was responsible for photographing and bagging evidence at each of the three locations where explosive devices were allegedly mailed: the River Avenue Petersen King law office as well as addresses on Washington Avenue and Stradbrook Avenue between July 3 and July 5, 2015. A package addressed to Iris Amsel and mailed to a Washington Avenue automobile repair shop was “neutralized” by the police bomb squad. Among its debris, Neumann testified, was a piece of copper wire embedded in the ceiling. The copper was stamped with a message that investigators could only partly decipher. It said “…turn what you sto … ll your helpers of cr…”

The debris from a third suspicious package mailed to 280 Stradbrook Ave. — again, safely detonated by the bomb unit — contained a message inscribed on a small capsule that said “report or we blow your head off,” court heard.

The suspicious package sent to that address appeared to be an electronic greeting card, Neumann testified, and was mailed in a standard card envelope. He said police tracked down the manufacturer, Carlton Cards, and found an example of the card that had been sent — it was a musical birthday card that played the song 1970s disco song Shake Your Booty.

Vanderhooft said the case against Amsel will begin with testimony from police officers, including forensic identification specialists and bomb-unit officers before the judge hears from civilian witnesses.

The judge is also expected to see video and photos taken from the bomb-unit’s robot during the investigation.

Lord also heard Tuesday from Winnipeg Police Service Const. Paul Barker, who was the first to arrive after the explosion. Ninety seconds after he was dispatched to respond to the bomb call, Barker found Mitousis sitting up against the closed door to her office, bleeding excessively and being helped by a co-worker who was applying gauze to her neck.

Barker said he could see that wouldn’t be sufficient to treat Mitousis’s serious injuries, so he went back to his unmarked cruiser for his first-aid kit. He ordered the offices be evacuated and helped Mitousis out of the building. He saw lacerations on her throat and chest, and had been told she had an abdominal injury from the blast. But when she moved her hands away from her abdomen, Barker testified he could see exposed bone in her left hand, and her right hand — which she ultimately lost — “was like an empty glove.”

Barker testified his focus was on Mitousis at the time, but that he could see from outside the building that panes of glass from her office windows had been broken. During a brief cross-examination from Zaman, he said he had not entered Mitousis’s office, nor had he seen anyone go in or out. The door to her office remained closed during his time in the building, he said.

Amsel, wearing a dark blue suit and red tie, listened to the testimony from the prisoner’s box. He was given earphones to ensure he can hear the court proceedings.

The trial, which is scheduled to continue into December, began last month with legal motions from the defence lawyers, who tried to have DNA evidence thrown out on the basis that it amounted to an illegal search because police had been “misleading” when they applied for a search warrant to obtain a sample of Amsel’s blood for analysis.

Lord rejected the argument, deciding police applied for the warrant with the best information they had at the time, and ruled the DNA evidence admissible in the trial.

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @thatkatiemay

Katie May
Reporter

Katie May is a general-assignment reporter for the Free Press.

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