Steven Randy Pirko
Image Credit: SUBMITTED
May 16, 2019 - 5:41 PM
KELOWNA - Steven Pirko collapsed into his mother’s arms and sobbed Nov. 19, 2016, just hours after he confessed to fatally attacking a man nearly three years earlier.
Pirko, who’s on trial for the second degree murder of Christopher Ausman, had requested to see his mother, Kerry Shane, in the hours after his confession.
When she walked into the room, he asked Cpl. Eric Boucher, “can I hug her?”
He got permission and reiterated a confession he'd previously given to police.
“I’m sorry, mom,” he said, between sobs. “I’m so sorry. For everything… I’m so sorry.”
He told his mom that he wasn’t trying to kill Ausman. He said he was hoping to “maybe knock him out.”
Pirko told police earlier that he and his friend Elrich Dyck were walking down Highway 33, and egging people on to fight.
Ausman ran across the street to meet them, and quickly got the upper hand on Dyck. Pirko said he tried to help his friend by hitting Ausman in the knee with a hammer, then Dyck told him to hit Ausman in the head.
He remembers swinging at him between two to three times, and Ausman went down “like a starfish.”
Elrich, he claimed, took the moment to get on top of Ausman, punched him in the face at least two times and then they ran and Pirko ditched the hammer.
Pirko, who is charged with Ausman's second degree murder, and Elrich who was not charged, had long been suspects in the murder.
There are several more weeks left in the trial and Crown counsel David Grabavac said he'd likely call up to 22 witnesses. He's interviewed 13, so far.
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