“What’s wrong?”
Those were the last words a friend and classmate spoke to a 13-year-old girl found dead in a Burnaby park six years ago.
The friend took the stand at the trial of Ibrahim Ali in B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver Friday.
Ali is accused of first-degree murder in the girl’s death.
The names of the victim and witness are protected by a publication ban.
When she first took the stand on Thursday, the woman, who said she had been a close friend of the victim after they met in a Grade 8 math class, said the victim appeared “normal” on July 18, 2017, the last day she saw her.
Cellphone video clips the witness took of the victim during a fire drill that morning were introduced as evidence, and they show the victim smiling.
During cross-examination Friday, however, defence lawyer Kevin McCullough took the victim through a statement the witness had made to police the day after the victim was found dead.
In it, she told police the last time she saw the victim was in a classroom at recess during summer school, and the last words she spoke to her were ‘What’s wrong?’”
The witness said there was a “translation issue” with that question.
“I was asking her how she was doing,” the witness said through a Mandarin interpreter. “It’s just like exchanging pleasantries.”
But McCullough noted, in her statement to police, the witness had said several times that she had asked the victim “What’s wrong?”
McCullough also questioned the witness about other parts of her police statement, including sections in which she told police the victim liked to draw “people bleeding” and that she sometimes rode SkyTrain without getting off at any stops.
When McCullough suggested the victim rode SkyTrain because she didn’t want to go home, the witness said she didn’t know the reason.
McCullough also suggested the witness knew the victim had had a boyfriend in Grade 8, despite telling the jury the victim did not have a boyfriend and didn’t talk about boys.
The witness said she did not know.
The cross-examination continues Monday.
