A Langley man who accidentally shot his twin brother and a friend will likely be deported to Sweden once he finishes serving a four-year jail sentence for a drunken error in judgment.
Ravinder Virk was severely intoxicated the night of Dec. 6, 2012 when he wounded his brother Parvinder and a friend, Dinh Ngo, in the kitchen of his Langley blueberry farm.
According to a description of the incident by the sentencing judge in Surrey Provincial Court, Ravinder Virk had been drinking most of the day.
When his twin told him to leave the kitchen because he was drunk, Ravinder left, then returned a few minutes later carrying a handgun and laughing.
When the brother tried to take the gun away, it went off twice during the struggle, injuring Parvinder’s right wrist and a finger on his left hand, and wounding Ngo in the left thigh.
The injured men at first tried to make up a story to conceal Ravinder Virk’s involvement, but that didn’t hold up under police questioning.
During the 11-day trial, the Crown prosecutor called the shootings a “drunken moment of non-judgment.”
Virk’s lawyer agreed.
Surrey Provincial Court Judge Michael Hicks convicted Virk on five criminal counts, including assault with a weapon, assault causing bodily harm and several weapons offences.
At the sentencing hearing, Judge Hicks said there was “no discernible explanation or motive” for the shootings, nor was there evidence of any animosity between the brothers or between Ravinder Virk and Ngo.
Virk had no prior criminal record.
Ngo required a lengthy hospital stay and now has to use a cane, and while Parvinder didn’t appear to suffer any long-term ill effects “it could have been much worse,” the judge said.
He sentenced Ravinder Virk to four years in jail.
Virk is a legal permanent resident of Canada but not a Canadian citizen.
The 48-year-old Virk is originally from India, but moved to Sweden where he became a citizen in his early twenties.
Because of that, the judge noted, Virk will face deportation to Sweden.
“As a permanent resident with convictions such as these, he is unable to apply for Canadian citizenship and inadmissible to Canada,” Hicks said.
The judge said when Virk came to Canada, he brought with him his two children from a marriage to a Swedish national, his parents, his brother and his brother’s family.
“It is part and parcel of difficult personal circumstances which flow from this conviction and which will likely see him separated from his family and forced to make a new life for himself in another country,” Hicks said.
His only chance to stay in Canada is to apply to remain on compassionate or humanitarian grounds, the judge said.
A written transcript of the Oct. 30 oral judgment was recently posted on the Provincial Court of BC website.