VANCOUVER — A man accused of aggravated assault for stabbing three people at a Vancouver Chinatown festival, in an attack that prompted debate over the handling of some psychiatric patients, has been found not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder.
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Eric Gottardi said Friday that the court doesn’t convict people of crimes for being sick.
The trial heard that Blair Donnelly, 66, had asked the Holy Spirit for a sign not to carry out the stabbings in September of 2023, but he didn’t get one and carried on with the attack because he “wanted to obey God.”
At a trial that wrapped last month, Donnelly testified he had initially planned to cycle to a coffee shop in Coquitlam on the day of the attack, but felt “prompted by God to go to Chinatown.”
He said he first went to Home Depot and bought a chisel because he “needed something to hurt somebody with.”
Gottardi ruled Friday that Donnelly lacked the ability to rationally choose to commit the crime.
“I find Mr. Donnelly has established on a balance of probability that he was suffering a mental illness at the time that rendered him incapable of knowing his actions were morally wrong,” Gottardi said.
At trial, Donnelly’s lawyer, Glen Orris, said his client was overwhelmed and convinced in the belief that God wanted him to stab people.
However, Crown counsel Mark Myhre argued the accused was capable at the time of knowing what he was doing was wrong.
Gottardi ruled that, for a man as devout as Donnelly, what he saw as a prompting from God was “ultimately irresistible.”
“His disordered thinking derived him of the ability to ‘rationally choose to commit’ those specific criminal acts on that date,” the judge said.
Donnelly listened to the ruling from the prisoners’ box while holding a Bible.
The trial heard that Donnelly was on unescorted leave from the B.C. Forensic Psychiatric Hospital on the day of the attack.
He has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, and the psychiatrist who testified in the trial in September said his more recent diagnosis was “schizoaffective disorder bipolar type,” which manifests as religious delusions.
Donnelly had previously been found not criminally responsible for stabbing his daughter to death in 2006, and for a 2017 attack on another psychiatric patient with a butter knife.
The Chinatown attack generated public outrage and national attention when B.C. Premier David Eby said he was “white-hot angry” to find out that Donnelly was on leave from the hospital on the day of the attack.
Orris told reporters after the verdict that the defence had initially planned on asking for a jury trial, but were worried the publicity would interfere with that.
Donnelly’s case is now being sent to the B.C. Review Board, which has jurisdiction over those found not criminally responsible, and it will make a determination on his case in 90 days.
Orris said Donnelly may be in hospital indefinitely.
He said he didn’t believe the B.C. Review Board was wrong when it allowed Donnelly to take unescorted leave on the day of the attack.
“I think on the basis of the evidence they had and his record, they were acting completely appropriately.”
He said the difficulty is that the resources aren’t there to “really look after these people in they way which we should” and Donnelly is no exception.
Donnelly was an intelligent man when on his medication, and he knew what was going on, Orris said.
Orris said one of the things that came about during the trial for Donnelly is that perhaps the message he was getting weren’t from God, but instead were coming from Satan, and he didn’t have to listen to those instructions.
“So in that sense, I think the process has given him a better insight into what he’s been dealing with, and that, I think, is a step toward hopefully resolving his problem.”
After reading his decision, Gottardi addressed the victims of the attack.
He acknowledged that what they experienced was tragic and “undoubtedly traumatic,” and said his ruling should not be seen as minimizing what happen.
The judge said Donnelly would not be leaving the courtroom or returning to the public.
“When properly resourced, that stream of institutional detention and treatment can serve well to protect members of the public,” he said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 24, 2025.
Ashley Joannou, The Canadian Press
