By Dan Walton
A hearing continues next month to determine whether prolific offender Ronald Teneycke should be labeled a dangerous offender.
If he is classified as such, the courts will have the ability to keep him locked up indefinitely.
If Teneycke ever has the chance to be free again, the public will be at risk because he’s a lost cause who cannot successfully be rehabilitated, the Crown is trying to prove.
His first criminal offence was in 1981 and his most recent was in 2015, when he failed to show up for his weekend jail sentence. While he was on the lam, he robbed a convenience store in Oliver, hijacked a pickup truck, shot the owner in the back and brought a police chase to an end by crashing the man’s vehicle in a Cawston orchard.
A Google search of “Ronald Teneycke” turns up dozens of news articles related to his constant involvement with the criminal justice system.
Dr. Will Reimer, a clinical psychologist who analyzed Teneycke, testified at the hearing, claiming that Teneycke is not always able to decipher right from wrong. Furthermore, it is very difficult to treat anybody who has had issues with substance abuse, mental health disorders and constant institutionalization since childhood, said the psychologist, who diagnosed Teneycke with a borderline personality disorder that’s complicated with narcissistic, anti-social, anti-authority and paranoid tendencies.
If Teneycke is ever free again, it would be almost impossible to safely supervise him, the Court was told.
“There has been so little success in the past with community supervision,” Reimer said.
Defence council Michael Welsh isn’t denying that Teneycke should be declared a dangerous offender, but he is arguing against an indefinite jail sentence.
The hearing was held in Penticton on May 23, 24 and 25 and will resume again on July 31.
