‘My daughters will never have their dad’: Peter Khill hears from Jonathan Styres’ family at emotional sentencing hearing

Peter Khill and Jonathan Styres share one similarity: they each fathered two little girls.

The glaring difference is one set of daughters can talk to their dad and hug him when he comes home from work, while the other has to look to the sky and wonder why they can't do the same.

Styres' family made that contrast abundantly clear in powerful victim impact statements delivered at Khill's sentencing hearing Wednesday, about four months after the Binbrook man was convicted of manslaughter in the shooting death of Styres.

Hearing my daughter say when she was four years old that she wanted to die so she could go see her dad is heartbreaking," Lindsay Hill, the mother of Styres' two children, tearfully said as she looked at Khill.

Your children still have their parent while my daughters will never have their dad."

Styres left behind a pair of baby girls when Khill blasted him twice with a pump-action shotgun after finding him rummaging through his pickup truck in the wee hours of Feb. 4, 2016.

In December, a 12-member jury ruled Khill didn't act in self-defence during the shooting, his biggest argument at trial.

The 33-year-old told the jury he feared for his life when - after yelling Hey! Hands Up!" at Styres - Styres partially turned toward him and brought his arms to just below chest-height, as if he was holding a gun. He also said his military training kicked in as he approached the silhouette of a person on his muddy driveway off Highway 56.

I felt there was an urgent, imminent threat ... and I needed to get control of the situation."

Khill later testified he resorted to deadly force because he felt it was his only option.

But Styres' family told him Wednesday it was just the worst option of many that were available to him.

All you had to was call 911," Vicki Martin, a close family member, said at court. A simple call to 911 and we wouldn't be here today."

You knew as soon as you picked up that gun what you would do," added Debbie Hill, Styres' ailing mother, who appeared at the hearing via Zoom. Why didn't you aim at the legs?"

The jury heard at trial Khill had a fully charged cellphone on his nightstand when he awoke to sounds on his driveway. He instead opted for the shotgun in his closet, stealthily venturing outside before shooting Styres once in the chest and once in the arm.

Your actions were those of someone who plain and simply acted as judge, jury and executioner," said Lindsay Hill, the mother of Styres' kids.

As the emotional impact statements were read before the court, Khill could see been sitting upright, taking big, deep breaths with his arms placed on the desk in front of him.

He shook his head as assistant Crown attorney Sean Doherty likened Styres' killing to Justice Andrew Goodman as an ambush." Doherty argued Styres was a defenceless, vulnerable victim; he didn't assault Khill or threaten him.

In my respectful submission, shooting someone with a shotgun, twice - (including) once when they were on their hands and knees - is much closer to murder than it is an accident," he said.

Doherty is asking for a sentence of between eight and 12 years, citing multiple aggravating factors including the stealthy approach Khill took to shooting Styres, the number of shots fired and the manner in which Styres was shot - on the ground and defenceless."

Defence lawyer Jeffery Manishen is asking for the minimum firearm-related manslaughter sentence of four years.

He vehemently disagreed with the Crown characterization of the incident as an ambush and pointed to his client's actions in the immediate aftermath of the shooting. Khill, he said, co-operated with investigators, spoke with the 911 operator, waved down responding officers to his driveway, performed CPR on Styres and told police where the gun was.

This conduct was much more near self-defence than it was near murder," Manishen said, later requesting Goodman consider the outcome of Khill's first trial - he was acquitted of second-degree murder in 2018, a result which was thrown out on appeal - during his sentencing.

Manishen presented the court with 57 character references on behalf of Khill - a staggering number Goodman said was the most I've ever had in a case."

The sheer amount of references was one of four mitigating factors Manishen asked Goodman to consider in sentencing. The other three were provocation (Manishen said Khill was provoked by Styres unlawfully entering his truck and property); near self-defence (Manishen said Khill defended himself because he thought he was going to be shot); and his conduct since the shooting (Manishen said Khill has no criminal record and is a valued contributor to his community).

For the first time in years, Khill was able to address the Styres family with a formal statement, saying there isn't a day that goes by where he doesn't think of his victim. He drew on the fact he and Styres both have young daughters.

There's now a hole within that family that will never filled, and it is painful to have been the one to have caused it," he said, later adding: I want to give you the best closure I can. Nobody wanted this tragic event to happen.

If I could change the outcome, I would. I am forever sorry."

Justice Goodman will deliver a sentence June 6.

Sebastian Bron is a reporter at The Spectator. sbron@thespec.com