Victim impact statements in Ian Stewart Gainer homicide trial
Posted November 30, 2022 7:09 pm.
Last Updated December 1, 2022 2:42 pm.
It’s been two and a half years since Lisa Arsenault was found brutally murdered in a south Edmonton hotel, and Wednesday, her family was able to address the man guilty in the crime.
Ian Stewart Gainer was initially charged with first-degree murder in the 2020 killing of Arsenault but pleaded guilty to the lesser charge of second-degree murder this September.
On May 24th, 2020, police were called to the Royal Lodge Hotel on Gateway Boulevard after Arsenault was found dead. Surveillance footage showed a man exiting the room, Edmonton Police released the video and were able to identify and charge Gainer with help from the public.
At a sentencing hearing, family and friends of Arsenault painted the picture of a loving woman, who despite hardships would do anything to help those in need.
But relatives shared in court Wednesday how they struggle to focus on the positive memories without the shadow of the disturbing details of her death.
“I can’t begin to explain how this has affected me,” Nicholas Arsenault, one of Lisa Arsenault’s sons, read as part of a victim impact statement, “I shouldn’t be standing here to talk on behalf of my mother.”
RELATED: First-degree murder charge in May death of Lisa Arsenault
Addressing Gainer directly, saying what he did “was sick and twisted. Stalking my mother, tying her up, and leaving her for dead.”
Ashley Kowalewski, Lisa’s half-sister, sharing she suffers from PTSD and is “forever traumatized by the evidence I have seen. No person should ever have to see their sister that way.”
Arsenault’s young niece shared how she still has nightmares of how her aunt died.
Ava, who is just 16-years-old told the courts she “can’t stop thinking about how she died, how she couldn’t breathe, and then I can’t breathe.”
Justice Susan Richardson will now review the case for sentencing, telling the victims family she will try to move the case forward before the 3rd anniversary of their loved ones death.
