After almost six years of court proceedings, a Trail man has been convicted of manslaughter in the death of a Trail senior.
Joel Anderson, charged with the second degree murder of Harold Paddock, 78, was instead found guilty of the lesser offence on Thursday, July 27.
The trial by Justice E. David Crossin was held in Vancouver Supreme Court.
Anderson was initially charged with assaulting Paddock, and then in January of 2019, the charge was upgraded to murder.
Anderson, 25 at the time of the offence, has not yet been sentenced and remains in jail.
The manslaughter conviction stems from a criminal act which occurred on August 22, 2017, in downtown Trail.
That morning, Trail police responded to calls of a “man down” in the middle of Bay Avenue near Highway 3B.
Officers arrived on scene to find the unconscious victim, later identified as Harold Paddock, laying in the road and bleeding from his head.
The senior was transported to Kootenay Boundary Regional Hospital where he later died.
Born June 13, 1939 in Stamford, Ontario, Paddock died on Sept. 19, 2017 in Trail.
Left to mourn were a son, daughter, grandchildren and many nieces and nephews.
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