A former Kamloops, B.C., lawyer who stole almost $800,000 from a client, stabbed him to death then smuggled the body out of his office in a plastic tote has been convicted of first-degree murder.
Rogelio “Butch” Bagabuyo was accused of killing of Mohd Abdullah, a lecturer at Thompson Rivers University, on March 11, 2022.
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Kathleen Ker said in a ruling handed down Tuesday in Kamloops that she has no doubt the murder was planned and deliberate, and “it defies logic, common sense and human experience” that the stabbing of Abdullah could have been spontaneous.
Bagabuyo was given the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment without parole for 25 years.
When asked if Bagabuyo wanted to address the court, he shook his head.
The trial heard that Abdullah hired Bagabuyo in 2016 and they conspired to hide money during Abdullah’s separation from his wife, but Bagabuyo spent more than $780,000 of that cash.
The Crown prosecutor said in closing arguments that Bagabuyo methodically planned the murder for more than a week after realizing he would no longer be able to fool Abdullah, who was increasingly impatient about getting his money back.
His defence lawyer said the death was “unexpected” and while his client admitted killing Abdullah at his office, it was manslaughter.
Ker said Tuesday that the only rational conclusion on the whole of the evidence was “Bagabuyo planned to kill Abdullah and undertook a number of preparatory steps in the days preceding the meeting of March 11.”
They included emailing Abdullah on March 1, 2022, to set up the meeting at his office, writing a to-do list on a cue-card reminding him what to do, purchasing plastic wrap and a “decoy tote” in the days leading up to the killing, the judge said.
“These steps were both carefully thought out and considered over a number of days,” Ker said. “The circumstantial evidence in my findings of fact related to the timeline of events between the email of March 1 and the meeting on March 11 make it fundamentally clear that this was a planned and deliberate murder.”
Ker noted that Bagabuyo left his office with three garbage bags and a tote that contained Abdullah’s body just two hours after the victim was seen walking in the direction of his office.
That short timeline, she said, coupled with the absence of defensive wounds on Bagabuyo when he was arrested, supported “the conclusion that a spontaneous, unplanned confrontation did not occur in this case.”
Bagabuyo was initially charged with indignity to human remains, then charged more than a year later with first-degree murder.
He had been out on bail since July 12, 2023, but was immediately taken into custody after the conviction.
The B.C. Law Society previously confirmed Bagabuyo is no longer a lawyer.
The judge-alone trial was split between Kamloops and Vancouver, but Ker said in October — after closing arguments and rebuttals had concluded — that she felt it was appropriate that the decision be given in Kamloops, where Abdullah was killed.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 3, 2026.
Brieanna Charlebois, The Canadian Press
