October 29, 2013
For The New Brunswick Beacon

BY: NICOLA MACLEOD

The testimony and evidence continued this afternoon in the McKenna murder trial in Fredericton’s Court of Queen’s Bench.

McKenna has been charged with the second degree murder of Kirk Blair, 61, of Geary, N.B. this past April. McKenna is accused of shooting Blair when he opened the door of his mobile home on the property where both men lived. McKenna was originally charged with first degree murder in May.

RCMP Constable Jean-Sébastian Pigeon told the court he was working the night Blair was killed. Pigeon and his partner were dispatched about an open-line 911 call from Geary, meaning nobody was on the other end.

As previously reported, Kirk Blair’s wife had called 911 after her husband was shot, but dropped the receiver when another gunshot was fired inside her home.

Pigeon’s partner decided to respond to the call.

The RCMP officer called for help after arriving on the murder scene alone.

Pigeon told the court that when he arrived he was told there was a man in the back of an RCMP car and another man was dead man inside the residence.

Both responding paramedics also testified this afternoon, telling the court they responded to a call for an unknown problem in Geary at 12:50 a.m. of May 1.

When they first entered the residence on Branch Road, paramedics noticed broken glass, a broken flowerpot, and Kirk Blair lying in the entrance of the home.

The paramedics immediately checked for a pulse in Blair’s neck. They found none. They proceeded to check for breathing and found nothing.

The victim was lying in front of the door of his mobile home on his side, wearing jeans and a blood soaked t-shirt with blood smeared on the floor around him. He had $440 in twenty-dollar bills in his pocket and a bullet hole in his side.

Pigeon introduced the court to the evidence collected from both the Blair and McKenna residences. It included shell casings found near Blair’s body and a shotgun found in McKenna’s couch.

He told the court that Blair’s body was sent to Saint John for an autopsy where bullet fragments were removed.

McKenna is being tried by Justice J. L. Clendening and 12 jurors. The trial continues tomorrow morning.