Vietnamese man gets life in prison for killing neighbor in Canada in feud over barbecue smoke

A Vietnamese man in Toronto has been sentenced to life in prison for murdering his upstairs neighbor in a feud over barbecue smoke, and his wife to six years for helping dispose of the body. Ontario Superior Court Justice Kenneth Campbell on Oct. 26 sentenced Khoa Tran, 36, to life with no chance of parole for 16 years for the second-degree murder of filmmaker Reeyaz Habib, 53, Global News reported.Tran's wife, Quynh (Isabelle) Nguyen, 30, had been convicted of being an accessory after the fact to manslaughter and of offering an indignity to a dead body.A jury found the couple guilty on June 3, when their bail was revoked. After enhanced credit for 146 days in pre-sentence custody, Nguyen has five years and four-and-a-half months left to serve.Campbell rejected the defense's proposal of a conditional sentence for Nguyen, two years less a day under house arrest followed by probation, as entirely unfit and in no way proportionate to the gravity of her offenses, calling her actions "truly despicable."Her lawyer, Tyler Smith, had argued that because Nguyen, a permanent resident, is not a Canadian citizen, a custodial sentence over six months would mean almost immediate deportation to Vietnam.Prosecutors had asked for 18 years before Tran could apply for parole and four to six years for Nguyen, while Tran's defense sought 12 to 13 years, CBC News reported. Second-degree murder carries an automatic life sentence, with parole ineligibility of 10 to 25 years.In June 2023, Tran and Nguyen owned a main-floor condo in a townhouse complex on Western Battery Road in Toronto's Liberty Village neighborhood, where Linh Hua, a longtime friend of the couple who had come from Vietnam, was staying with them. Habib, who lived alone, had the unit directly above.Habib, an alumnus of the Canadian Film Centre, had left a 15-year career on Bay Street, Toronto's financial district, to pursue filmmaking, the center said after his death.During the five-week trial, the court heard that smoke from Tran's barbecue drifted up into Habib's windows and that Habib repeatedly told Tran he did not want it in his unit.Prosecutors argued the dispute escalated after Habib threatened to go to the condo board to have Tran removed for infractions. Filmmaker Reeyaz Habib, victim of a murder in Canada. Photo courtesy of Toronto Police Service Habib was killed in his home in the early hours of June 6, 2023. Neighbors heard screams from the direction of his unit, and before his body was discovered, one saw Tran leave it, lock the door and go back to his own.Habib's decomposing body was found on June 8, 2023, in a trash compactor in an underground garbage dumpster, wrapped in blankets and taped up with handles. Handwritten notes attached to it described the contents as trash, and one carried Tran's fingerprint, Campbell said.Had the compactor's operator not found it, the judge said, the body would likely never have been found. The duct-tape handles carried DNA from Habib, Tran and Nguyen.Habib was reported missing on June 9, before police had identified the body. Officers found blankets nailed over his window and the home carefully cleaned, and surveillance cameras had captured Tran throwing Habib's bike and computer into a nearby dumpster.Police announced Tran's arrest on June 30, 2023, on charges of indignity to a human body and obstruction of justice, CTV News reported. A second-degree murder charge followed in November that year.A forensic pathologist could not determine a cause of death because of the decomposition but testified that Habib had 35 external injuries, 24 of them inflicted before death, and internal injuries consistent with being beaten to death or strangled.Tran, a software developer, testified at trial that he threw away Habib's bicycle out of anger but had nothing to do with his death. Khoa Tran and his wife, Quynh (Isabelle) Nguyen. Photo from Khoa Tran's Facebook page Campbell found elements of planning, as Nguyen knew of her husband's plan to go upstairs and kill Habib that night. The couple had Hua sleep in their bedroom instead of on the living room mattress where she normally slept, so that Tran could work in the living room.When Hua heard loud footsteps and someone yelling for help upstairs around 3 a.m., Nguyen told her to ignore the noises and go back to sleep, saying Habib was likely filming."Of course, these comments were nonsense. They had discussed what to say so she would not worry," Campbell said. Nguyen also told Hua to tell police, if they asked, that all three had slept in the bedroom, creating an alibi for Tran.The judge said Tran killed Habib to end his "consistent and bothersome interference" over the barbecue and to stop him from telling the condo board that a third person was living with the couple against the rules."The killing of Mr. Habib was a senseless and selfish act by Mr. Tran," Campbell said.He was equally scathing about Nguyen, saying she not only helped dispose of the body but tried over an extended period to help her husband avoid arrest and prosecution. "These were callous and selfish acts taken to shield and protect her husband, the murderer," he said.Campbell said neither had expressed any remorse or regret, though Nguyen had addressed the court at the sentencing hearing: "I just want to say I am sorry to take the court time and money. I feel sorry for the family loss." Tran told the court in September that he had nothing to say while an appeal is pending.