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Taken from the Toronto Star.

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Victim accused of first blow
Witness says he was hit at club

20-year-old later stabbed to death


PETER SMALL
STAFF REPORTER

The student stabbed at a rave party at The Docks nightclub actually attacked another man before he was fatally wounded, a murder trial has been told.

Charles Coulter testified yesterday that before he left the Toronto club with his brother in the early hours of Feb. 4, 2001, someone behind him punched his head, then struck him again when he turned to face the assailant.

"It was Salim Jabaji, I now know," Coulter told a Superior Court jury.

Jabaji, 20, died after being stabbed in the chest in the darkened waterfront club packed with dancing patrons. The Mohawk College engineering student had taken some time off his studies to look after his sick father in Niagara Falls.

Jeffrey Tuck, 24, has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder in Jabaji's death.

Coulter, 28, testified yesterday that after Jabaji's attack he and his twin brother David regrouped on the dance floor. About 30 seconds later, their friend Tuck joined them.

Coulter agreed with Tuck's lawyer, Christopher Hicks, that Coulter told the other two he'd "been jumped" by someone.

Coulter also agreed that Tuck at that point volunteered that someone had just attacked him as well. "He said, `Yeah, me too,'" Coulter told Hicks.

Coulter said earlier that night he had been attacked three separate times by Robert Conejeros, Jabaji's friend, on the dance floor. The third assault only ended after a bouncer grabbed Conejeros and ejected him.

After the last attack, the Coulter brothers and Tuck drove away from the club, Coulter testified.

At that point he noticed that Tuck was bleeding, he said.

Tuck told the Coulters that, "one of the guys went after him with a knife and he got the knife off of him and he stabbed him," Coulter testified.

Later that day as they drove a girl home to Barrie, Tuck was silent on the long trip except to say quietly to himself, "I'm f---ed," Coulter told Hicks.

Hicks asked Coulter why he didn't tell police right away about Tuck's confession.

"They wouldn't believe us anyway," he replied.

It was only after Coulter's twin David was wrongly charged with murder in Jabaji's death that it even occurred to him to tell police, he agreed with Crown prosecutor Robin Flumerfelt.

The jury returns to hear more evidence on Monday.

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Stab victim likely had no time to fight: MD
Fatal injury probably came in surprise attack
Wounds consistent with knife found in club


PETER SMALL
STAFF REPORTER

The stab wound to the heart that killed a college student at a rave party at The Docks is consistent with him being surprised and having no chance to defend himself, a murder trial has heard.

But Dr. Charles Lee, a forensic pathologist, testified yesterday that there are too many variables to determine the exact way Salim Jabaji was slain.

Crown prosecutor Robin Flumerfelt asked Lee if, hypothetically, "a victim was attacked by surprise and stabbed in the heart without having a chance to defend himself, would that explain the wound to the heart?"

That is one possible explanation, Lee replied.

Jabaji died on Feb. 4, 2001, in the Toronto waterfront club. The floor was so crowded and dark that people continued dancing even as Jabaji lay bleeding on the floor, court has heard.

The 20-year-old Mohawk College engineering student had taken time off his studies to look after his sick father in Niagara Falls.

Jeffrey Tuck, 24, has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder in Jabaji's death.

Lee, who conducted the autopsy on Jabaji, told the Superior Court jury that the otherwise healthy young man had two major wounds.

The fatal wound penetrated the rib cage and pierced the heart, and was consistent with a knife with a single-sided blade about 2.5 centimetres wide and 6 centimetres in length.


"The wound that you observed, could it have been caused by this weapon?" asked Flumerfelt, holding a small dark-handled knife found by police on the floor of the crowded nightclub.

"Yes, it could," Lee replied.

The second wound the victim sustained was a cut to the outer part of his upper arm that went through the muscle and sliced away part of the bone, Lee said.

"It's consistent with what are called defensive injuries," Lee said.

The dark-handled knife has no hilt of any significant size, Lee agreed with Flumerfelt.

Lee also agreed with the prosecutor that if the attacker hit Jabaji's arm bone with such a knife, his hand could slip over the insignificant hilt and cut his baby finger.

As Tuck left the nightclub he complained about a bleeding baby finger, according to a previous witness, Charles Coulter.

Tuck told his friends that someone had come after him with a knife, that he had managed to get it away from his attacker, whom he then stabbed, Coulter has told the court.

At issue is how the knife got into the club despite security measures. According to club security videotapes, a man — who has been identified as Tuck — appeared to have been searched as he entered The Docks, court heard. The trial continues today.

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Accused in stabbing `had no choice'
Was attacked by victim, trial told

Student, 20, killed at local nightclub


PETER SMALL
STAFF REPORTER

A man accused of fatally stabbing a student during a rave party at The Docks says he was just defending himself from a large stranger with a knife.

"I just wanted to get away," a tearful Jeffrey Tuck said when he testified in his defence yesterday. "He grabbed on to me. I had to do it. I had no choice. I didn't want to hurt him."

The 24-year-old Scarborough man has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder in the Feb. 4, 2001, stabbing death of Salim Jabaji, 20, a top engineering student at Hamilton's Mohawk College.

Tuck told a Superior Court jury that he went into the Toronto waterfront nightclub behind his friends, twin brothers David and Charlie Coulter.

On the crowded dance floor, Charlie Coulter got into a brief scuffle with a rave regular, Robert Conejeros, Tuck said. Conejeros then attacked Coulter two separate times before a bouncer beat him up, he said.

Conejeros, a friend of Jabaji's, has testified that Charlie Coulter was the attacker.

Tuck said he then tried to leave but saw a stranger built like a football linebacker staring angrily, swearing and blocking his way. "I was scared," he told his lawyer, Christopher Hicks.

"I see the man lift up his arm," Tuck said. "I see what appears to be a knife in his hand."

Tuck said he grabbed the knife with his left hand. "If I didn't get the knife off of him right away, he would have killed me."

He said someone hit him from behind, his ball cap fell over his eyes, blinding him, and he swung his left arm to repel the first attacker. The man then grabbed his hands, Tuck testified. "I pushed him away with both hands."

Tuck said he fled, found the Coulter brothers, and told them he escaped from a man with a knife but might have stabbed him. He still had the knife and noticed his hands were bleeding, Tuck said. David Coulter took the knife away and he never saw it again, he added.

In his cross-examination, Crown prosecutor Robin Flumerfelt suggested Tuck was a bully who pulled his knife on Jabaji. "You thought you could get away with it because it was dark," he said.

"That's not true," Tuck replied.

Flumerfelt suggested Tuck realized afterward that he had a problem because he bled at the scene and his DNA would incriminate him. So he conspired with the Coulter brothers to say he had killed in self-defence, but later tried to revise his story because it was flimsy, the Crown said.

"Nothing was made up," Tuck replied.

Flumerfelt referred Tuck to transcripts of secretly recorded phone calls in which he discussed the slaying with Charlie Coulter. "In those three hours of conversations, you never talk about defending yourself," he said.

Tuck replied he never discussed details in those calls.

"You stabbed and ended the life of this straight-A student who had taken time off his co-op term to look after his parents because he attacked you with a knife?" Flumerfelt asked.

"He tried to kill me," Tuck said. "What was I supposed to do?"

The trial continues today.

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Was rave knifing self-defence?
Accused's life at stake, trial told

But no mention of this in calls: Crown


PETER SMALL
STAFF REPORTER

Jeffrey Tuck stealthily stabbed a Mohawk College student to death during a dark, crowded rave party for his own gratification, then snuck away, a Crown prosecutor says.

"He murdered Salim Jabaji for no reason except his own satisfaction," Robin Flumerfelt told a jury at Tuck's second-degree murder trial yesterday.

But Christopher Hicks, lawyer for the 24-year-old Scarborough man, said in his final arguments that Tuck was just defending himself. "He sincerely believed that he was fighting for his own life — getting the knife before the knife got him."

Jabaji, a 20-year-old engineering student at Hamilton's Mohawk College, lay bleeding to death on Feb. 4, 2001 from two knife wounds — one in the heart — as patrons danced at The Docks, a Toronto club.

Tuck's claim that he was defending himself from an attacking Jabaji is fraught with problems, Flumerfelt told the jury.

"If this athletic guy comes after me unexpectedly with a knife, how come he's dead and not me? That's a real problem for Jeffrey Tuck," Flumerfelt said.

More ridiculous is his claim to have grabbed the knife blade from Jabaji, yet he had no injuries on his palms, she argued.

Tuck never went to police nor did he ever, in three hours of secretly taped calls, mention that he was defending himself or that Jabaji had a knife but instead showed himself desperate not to be caught, Flumerfelt said.

But the defence lawyer argued that Tuck was telling the truth when he testified that he fought for his life and never meant to kill Jabaji. "It is supported by other evidence," Hicks said.

Tuck's copious bleeding from finger cuts and his statements to friends after the stabbing confirm he struggled for the knife, the lawyer said. Tuck didn't go to police because he didn't trust them, he added. "The last thing he wants to do is go to police and say, `I am responsible.'"

The injuries suffered by the deceased back Tuck's testimony that the two grappled for the knife and that he accidentally stabbed Jabaji when Tuck pushed him away, Hicks said.

Tuck's former friend, Charlie Coulter, agreed that the accused tried to be a peacemaker in a confrontation with a friend of Jabaji's earlier that night, Hicks said. Tuck was attacked by Jabaji "without provocation," probably because he was seen to be Coulter's friend, he said.

Justice David McCombs charges the jury today.