Coquilynn Frenchman says a Saskatoon man who was stabbed to death in the middle of a sunny afternoon nearly two years ago had been aggressively pursuing her and the man accused of killing him.
On Wednesday, under cross-examination, she told a jury she was scared David Merasty was going to hurt her and believed her friend, Lajray Orlando Redman Gordon, came to her defence.
Gordon is accused of stabbing Merasty after they crossed paths in the 300 block of Avenue E South on June 18, 2016. He is on trial at Saskatoon Court of Queen’s Bench, charged with second-degree murder.
The jury heard Merasty followed Frenchman and Gordon into a yard after Frenchman made a rude comment to Merasty over a request for a cigarette. She said she was high on methamphetamine and trying to be tough, but yelled at Merasty to “walk away” when she realized he wasn’t backing down.
Frenchman said Gordon stepped in and she heard Merasty call him a racial slur. She remembered seeing Merasty lunge at Gordon and raise his arm in the air before she turned away; she said she could hear the men fighting but didn’t see what happened between them.
Court exhibit photos from the second-degree murder trial of Lajray Orlando Redman Gordon show where David Merasty was stabbed in the 300 block of Avenue E South, off 20th Street.
The next thing she saw was Merasty, bleeding and begging her for help. Gordon was nowhere to be seen, she said.
“Everything just happened so fast,” French testified.
“Over a stupid cigarette.”
She told the defence Gordon did not seem impaired at the time, even though they had used drugs together earlier that day.
Frenchman said it was the last time she saw Gordon.
Wilma Merasty holds a photo of her son David in August 2016.
The case went unsolved for months until Frenchman contacted Merasty’s mother, Wilma. Police showed the witness a StarPhoenix article featuring Wilma to demonstrate the importance of her information, Sgt. Doug McNeil of the police service’s Major Crimes Unit testified.
Gordon was arrested at his apartment four months later, in October 2016.