Louisa Lafferty, the Fort Good Hope mother of murder victim Charlotte Lafferty is planning a public grief, healing and trauma session in the fall.
Her announcement comes two weeks after her daughter Charlotte Lafferty’s killer, Keenan McNeely, had his appeal of his conviction quashed by the Northwest Territories Court of Appeal.
McNeely, who was just shy of his 18th birthday when he was convicted, appealed to have his adult sentenced overturned and argued he should’ve been sentenced as a youth.
Charlotte, a mother to three boys, was 23 at the time of her death in 2014.
It reportedly took only 15 minutes for the three-judge appeal panel to reach its decision in Yellowknife last month.
McNeely was represented by a court-appointed, taxpayer-funded lawyer something the Crown had unsuccessfully argued against saying there were no grounds for an appeal.
McNeely was sentenced to life in prison in 2017 with no chance to apply for parole fort at least ten years.
Louisa Lafferty says she plans to be at every parole board hearing, presumedly in the hopes that he does not receive early release.
The earliest McNeely will be eligible for parole is March 2024.
The three judge court of appeal panel also ruled he would not be able to serve his sentence in the North, as he had requested.
However they did rule that he could re-apply for that in the future.
Louisa Lafferty says she wants to help her family and anyone else affected by Charlotte’s death with a grief program that she intends to propose to the community.
She says the family will be holding a private ceremony – likely this month – followed by a community barbecue at the site of Charlotte’s death near the seniors centre in Fort Good Hope.
Louisa says she’ll post dates to Facebook once they are confirmed for both the barbecue and the grief seminar.