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Woman pleads guilty to assaults, shaving heads for her dealer

Mary Dyson is awaiting sentencing for charges including assault with a weapon, confinement and breaking and entering.
Image Credit: Contributed

KAMLOOPS – The lawyer for a woman who kept video footage of herself beating and shaving heads of at least two women, told Kamloops Supreme Court during a sentence hearing his client was acting under the direction of her boss.

Mary Lynn Dyson, 30, pleaded guilty last month to charges of assault with a weapon, breaking and entering, and unlawful confinement stemming from two separate home invasions in 2012.

Officers discovered the videos of Dyson’s violence on memory cards in her purse after arresting her on drug trafficking charges in 2012.

Crown prosecutor Sarah Firestone showed a video of Dyson and another woman invading Renee Chan’s house to attack her for not paying her drug debt. Both women ran toward Chan and began throwing punches. Dyson jumped on Chan and kicked her as she yelled several epithets. In the video, Chan asks for forgiveness after saying she “ran in fear.”

The court learned Dyson later duct-taped the woman’s wrists, shaved her head, and forced her to call herself a “goof.”

No charges were laid on Dyson’s alleged partner in the crime as she died from a drug overdose.

Firestone said other videos Dyson kept involved more head shavings, beatings, and one clip where she directed Chan to beat another woman.

“These break and enters had no purpose but to use violence,” Crown counsel Sarah Firestone said.

Firestone played a second video clip which showed Dyson wearing armoured motocross gloves as she assaulted a female associate of hers in a stairwell at her home on Mulberry Avenue. Crown said Dyson beat her to punish her for shoplifting; the group she was part of feared it would bring unwanted attention from police.

Dyson’s mother, sister and brother all attended the sentencing. During the video evidence, Dyson’s mother covered her ears and eyes. Shortly after the two-minute video played, she left the courtroom.

While specific details of Dyson’s home invasions did not go to trial, Dyson’s lawyer Chris Thompson told the court she was directed by her boss and drug dealer, Mark Salai.

“The person on that video is not the person in that box,” Thompson said.

Thompson said Dyson continues to take extensive steps to rehabilitate in prison where she took various courses and regularly sees a counsellor. He said he is “surprised (she) is still alive” after her history of drug addiction, prostitution, abuse, and sexual abuse. Thompson says Dyson wants to receive counselling for her sexual abuse – a particular service Dyson said is not available in prison.

Choking back tears, Dyson used her opportunity to address the court to speak about her rocky past and a prison system she claims doesn’t work. She admitted to shaving her sister’s head, allegedly to comply with orders.

“Basically I was told to make sure everyone was doing what they were supposed to be doing," she told Supreme Court Justice Ian Meiklem.

Firestone requested a four to eight year prison term.

Dyson has been in custody since July, 2012. Meiklem will make his decision July 15.

To contact a reporter for this story, email gbrothen@infotelnews.ca, or call 250-319-7494. To contact the editor, email mjones@infotelnews.ca or call 250-718-2724.

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