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Ottawa police have charged a man with first-degree murder after the brutal daytime killing of a mother in a park on Thursday.
Police said Friday that 36-year-old Fsha Tehkle, of Montreal, faces first-degree murder charges in what police described as a femicide.
He’s accused of killing Brkti Berhe, 36, of Ottawa.
“Tehkle had a domestic relationship with a family member of the victim,” police said. “This tragic event is a femicide.”
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Femicide is generally defined as “the killing of women and girls because of their gender” often driven by stereotyped gender roles, discrimination towards women and girls or unequal power relations between women and men, the police said. The Ottawa Police Service also builds on the definition recommended by community partners as “the misogynist killing of women and girls because of their gender, overwhelmingly committed by men.”
Tekhle appeared in court Friday afternoon by video from the courthouse cellblock, wearing a grey sweatshirt and a short beard. He spoke to the court through his defence lawyer, Alan Brass, who said his client does not understand English and speaks Tigrinya, the language of Eritrea.
Tekhle also speaks some Hebrew, and Brass said he was able to communicate with Tekhle and translate the remand conditions for the court.
Tekhle was remanded into custody and instructed to avoid all communication with a list of 18 people, including family members of the victim and potential witnesses.
Brass requested, and was granted a standard publication ban on the hearing.
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“We await disclosure (of Crown evidence) in order to mount a full and complete defence,” Brass said when reached for comment Friday.
Eyewitnesses to the fatal stabbing at Paul Landry Park on Uplands Drive said a man leapt from a car, ran at the woman and began to attack her. A witness said the man repeatedly stabbed the woman before slashing at her neck, ran back to his car and drove away.
Another man reportedly ran after the car to photograph its licence plate.
Another person protected the victim’s children while a woman tended to the dying mother, telling her: “Your children are OK, your children are safe.”
With files from Aedan Helmer
More to come…
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