A 64-year-old man found guilty in the manslaughter death of a man who had repeatedly harassed him has been sentenced to three years in prison.
Jeffrey Scott Van Dyke’s March 2024 trial before Judge Jennifer Oulton heard he was the subject of repeated harassment from Scott Alan Carver. The court heard Van Dyke was protecting his electric scooter when Carver sustained fatal head injuries on June 2, 2022. He died later in hospital.
Van Dyke was cuffed by sheriffs after the Jan. 22 sentencing. As he was being led out of court, he turned and said, “I apologize to the family for any inconvenience. My condolences to the family and the court.”
However, Oulton said in her ruling she had not found Van Dyke’s expressed remorse genuine.
“It is not a wholesale acceptance of responsibility,” she said.
Oulton heard the cause of death was a blunt force head injury that caused a scalp laceration, a skull fracture and a buildup of blood on the brain.
Carver underwent brain surgery and was stable for several days before dying, Crown prosecutor Jenny Dyck said at the trial’s start.
Oulton found Van Dyke guilty last April.
Carver’s sister Laura Morrow gave a victim impact statement as Van Dyke looked on. She said her brother’s death heavily impacted their mother.
“She would never see or talk to her son again,” Morrow said. “I tried my best to help her.”
That factored into Oulton’s decision, as did her rejection of Van Dyke’s protection of property defence and the number of pushes as well as a strike with a cane involved in Carver’s injuries.
Oulton found there was intention behind the final push, and that it was “reasonable foreseeable that push would cause bodily harm.”
“It was Mr. Van Dyke’s choice on how to respond,” Oulton said. “Mr. Carver was a frail man in a weakened state.”
The judge noted, “sentences below four years are rare” in such cases.
What happened?
The pair both lived in low-barrier housing at First Avenue and Main Street in Vancouver.
Defence lawyer Glen Orris told Oulton at trial that Van Dyke had been the recipient of multiple communications from Carver designed to harass, anger and insult.
Staff had warned Carver about his behaviour.
Dyck said the relationship between the two men was antagonistic but mostly on Carver’s part. She said Carver repeatedly called Van Dyke vulgar and sexual names.
Carver was gravely injured in a series of shoving incidents after Van Dyke arrived at the building on his electric scooter, the court heard. Much of the incident was caught on CCTV. During sentencing, Oulton called that video the case's most compelling evidence.
He arrived to find Carver writing sexual slurs on the sidewalk in chalk. The video showed he appeared to be drinking from a bottle of alcohol.
Van Dyke pushed Carver, who toppled backward. Carver then took a swipe at Van Dyke with his cane.
Both men wound up on the ground after which Van Dyke hit Carver with the cane. The former retreated.
Soon, Carver approached the scooter and kicked it twice after which Van Dyke shoved him again. That time, Carver did not get back up.
Oulton ruled the amount of force used was not reasonable in the circumstance and found Van Dyke guilty of manslaughter.
During sentencing, Oulton said “there was a long-standing animosity between the two men.”
Orris told the judge his client had not wanted to engage in a conflict, and that he had three times moved away from Carver and twice asked for help from housing staff. Orris said that requested help didn’t come.
Dyck said Van Dyke had a substantial criminal record for assault, drug possession for trafficking, break and enter and extortion but had not had run-ins with the law for some years.
The death was the city's seventh homicide of the year.
