'I slowly came back to reality': Veltman testimony concludes

WARNING: The video and the details in this article may be disturbing to some viewers

Nathaniel Veltman, 22, returned to the witness box in a Windsor, Ont. courtroom Tuesday, his eighth day in testimony.

Veltman has previously pleaded not guilty to four counts of terrorism-motivated first-degree murder and one count of terrorism-motivated attempted murder for the June 6, 2021 attack on the Afzaal family in London, Ont.

Grandmother Talat, her son Salman, his wife Madiha and their 15-year-old daughter Yumnah all died after being struck by a pickup truck. Their son, nine at the time, survived his injuries.

Veltman has previously admitted at trial he drove his pickup truck into the family while they waited to cross the intersection of Hyde Park Road and South Carriage Road.

Much of the day Tuesday was spent in arguments in the absence of the jury, the content of which is subject to a publication ban.

Veltman returned to testify, briefly, late Tuesday.

In re-examination, his defence lawyer Christopher Hicks asked about statements Veltman made to a doctor at the Elgin-Middlesex Detention Centre on June 9, 2021.

“I slowly came back to reality yesterday,” Veltman said he told the doctor. “I felt like I was in a dream.”

He also told the jury he mentioned to being “increasingly depersonalized and detached from reality.”

 

JUDGE INSTRUCTS JURY ON THE LAW

Justice Renee Pomerance gave the jury another mid-trial instruction about the difference between Veltman’s statements to police or doctors versus his testimony at trial.

Statements to police — which the jury has seen — can be used as “sources of evidence as proof of what happened.”

But his statements to doctors “are not admissible for their truths,” she told the jury.

The judge then addressed the potential differences between testimony and statements.

“To the extent they are inconsistent with each other, you will consider that in determining whether and to what extent you rely on either of them in deciding the case,” Pomerance said.

She then talked about the “timing of a statement,” specifically about the Crown’s assertion Monday in their cross-examination that Veltman’s story has “evolved over time” as it relates to his state of mind.

“In assessing whether a version was just made up over time, you might consider whether Mr. Veltman made similar statements at an earlier point in time,” Pomerance told them in reference to Veltman’s testimony Tuesday.

 

SECOND DEFENCE WITNESS TAKES THE STAND

Late Tuesday afternoon, the defence then called their second witness, Dr. Julian Gojer, a forensic psychiatrist.

Hicks walked Dr. Gojer through his resume for more than 20 minutes and then the trial ended Tuesday afternoon at approximately 4 p.m.

Hicks told the jury he would continue with Dr. Gojer’s experience first thing Wednesday morning.