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The British Columbia Review Board says the risk posed by a man found not criminally responsible for killing his three children is now “manageable” in the community with oversight, supervision and multiple conditions.
The board decided last month to grant Allan Schoenborn a conditional discharge requiring that he live under supervision and the written reasons for that decision were made public on Wednesday.
The panel that reviewed the case says in the 14-page document that Schoenborn’s mental state has been stable for years, his psychotic disorder has been in full remission and he has been compliant with his medication.
B.C. Premier David Eby is criticizing the review board’s decision to grant a conditional discharge to Allan Schoenborn, the man found not criminally responsible for killing his three children in 2008, calling it ‘deeply concerning.’ Criminal defence lawyer Kyla Lee says Eby’s comments are ‘inappropriate’ and undermine confidence in the justice system. Lee gives a legal analysis behind the conditional release decision.
It says he has been gradually granted more access to the community since 2019, and that most recently he has been living at a staffed supportive-living environment where he is able to stay in his own cottage.
Schoenborn was found not criminally responsible for the first-degree murders of his three children — five-year-old Cordon, eight-year-old Max, and 10-year-old Kaitlynne — at their Merritt, B.C., home in 2008.
The board stopped short of granting him an absolute discharge, pointing to an expert report that says without oversight in the community he would likely have no connections, raising the risk of him stopping treatment and relapsing.
A psychiatric report says Schoenborn’s long-term plans have been to live in an apartment and get a cat, and that he said he is not interested in an intimate relationship.
The British Columbia Review Board granted Allan Schoenborn, the man who killed his three children in 2008, a conditional discharge. The decision has been met with shock and anger by family and community members.
The board’s written decision notes that lawyers for both the attorney general and the director of the forensic hospital argued that the evidence “continues to establish that Mr. Schoenborn meets the threshold of significant threat so as to warrant the continued involvement of forensic services in Mr. Schoenborn’s life and board oversight.”
The written decision says the crimes in question are “of the utmost seriousness.”
“The depth of anguish and heartbreak experienced by the victims’ family and loved ones is immeasurable and cannot be overstated,” it says.
A representative for the family of Schoenborn’s victims has called the decision to grant the conditional discharge “baffling.”
