After 17-year-old Tyson MacDonald vanished in eastern Prince Edward Island in mid-April, leading to a massive search before his body was discovered, a teenager entered a guilty plea and was sentenced to two further months in youth jail plus 30 days of community supervision.
The teenager has already spent four months in imprisonment at the Summerside adolescent jail, where he is kept apart from other prisoners. In February, he entered a guilty plea to charges of deceiving law enforcement and obstructing the course of justice.
Provincial Court Judge Nancy Orr described the misguided search for MacDonald that the teen’s lies set in motion, eventually involving scores of civilians as well as 60 police officers, dog teams, aircraft, and drones scouring eastern P.E.I. “It is not just the dollar cost of the resources expended, it is the human cost, the people who diligently searched,” Orr said.
“It’s the damage to the neighbourhood, the broken trust… These are the reasons why [his] acts are so grave.
But the judge pointed out some positive aspects: the young guy accepted responsibility for his acts, had no past criminal history, and “acknowledged his wrongdoing through his guilty plea.”
When MacDonald’s family last heard from the Grade 12 student, he mentioned that he and several buddies were heading to a hockey game in Charlottetown.
Two young people were accused of first-degree murder and tampering with human remains after his body was discovered in a forested area a few days following his disappearance. The other adolescent has not yet entered a plea and is still facing the two accusations. The next court date for his case is June.
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