A report into a triple stabbing at a festival in Vancouver’s Chinatown last year says the man accused of the crimes had been let out of a psychiatric care facility 99 times in the year prior without incident.
The report, authored by former Abbotsford Police chief Bob Rich, says Blair Donnelly was on his 100th unescorted leave from the B.C. Forensic Psychiatric Hospital on Sept. 10, 2023, when he allegedly stabbed three festival goers at the Light Up Chinatown Festival.
The external review, ordered by the provincial government after the stabbings, says Donnelly was found not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder (NCRMD) for stabbing his daughter to death in 2006 while “suffering from a psychotic delusion that God wanted him to kill her.”
He also stabbed a friend while out on a day pass in 2009 and attacked a fellow patient with a butter knife shortly after returning from leave in 2017, according to B.C. Review Board documents.
Rich’s report makes several recommendations to better handle “higher-risk patients,” including bolstering their care teams, improving policies around granting patient leaves, shoring up hospital staff training and the use of “risk-management tools,” such as GPS tracking systems.
Victims rights advocate Dave Teixeira said the report is a blueprint for changing a system he says is “ideologically bent” to push patients into the community.
“What I read…mirrors what staff, the good leadership at [FPH] and victims’ families have been saying for years: that the process is broken,” he said. “The Rich report clearly states that what happened with Blair Donnelly a year ago was bound to happen.”
Teixeira said he applauds the introduction of a new policy to identify patients like Donnelly who present an elevated risk to the public and treat them with extra caution.
The man accused of stabbing three people in Vancouver’s Chinatown while out on an unsupervised day pass from a psychiatric hospital was described as a ‘significant threat’ and a ‘high risk of relapsing’ at a hearing five months beforehand.
But defence lawyer Rishi Gill said the recommendations are just “lipstick.”
“I’m glad that they didn’t do anything draconian on this. They’ve kept the changes somewhat cosmetic, and it’s not controversial,” said Gill.
B.C. Health Minister Adrian Dix said all of the report’s recommendations had been accepted, and some were already being implemented at FPH.
“Mr. Rich’s work will make people safer, both staff in the facility and, most importantly, the public,” said Dix.
Generally, patients at FPH are entitled to a Review Board hearing to assess their custody once per year. The hearings determine what type of release a patient may be eligible for, including community outings.
Once a patient is allowed day passes, safety assessments are conducted by hospital staff to determine whether outings should be permitted.
Donnelly’s review board documents noted he had a history of “sudden” violence.
He was the subject of a BCRB hearing on April 13, 2023, five months before the stabbings in Chinatown, and was subsequently granted leave from the hospital, including overnight stays in the community of up to 28 days, at the discretion of the director of the facility.
The hearing decision document said Donnelly’s leave was “for the purpose of assisting in his reintegration into society.”
But in his key report findings, Rich said: “It is my opinion that some patients may never be well enough to live unsupervised in the community.”
“That lept off the page for me,” said Teixeira.
“I read that we need to up our game as a society and provide the support and treatment so folks can have the opportunity to get better. But it doesn’t mean that just because they followed the five or six steps in the process that they get out.”
Donnelly was charged with three counts of aggravated assault. All three victims — a couple in their 60s and a woman in her 20s — were seriously injured in the stabbings.
At the time, B.C. Premier David Eby told reporters he was “white-hot” angry over the approval of Donnelly’s day release without supervision.
Donnelly is due back in Vancouver provincial court in March 2025.