NOT GUILTY: Alphonse didn’t mean to kill friend when he stabbed him three times in 2016

KELOWNA – A Rutland man charged with stabbing a friend who was like a brother to him at a house party in 2016 has been found not guilty. 

Chad Colton Alphonse is charged with the second degree murder of Waylon Percy Jackson at his townhouse in March 2016.

Crown lawyer Dave Grabavac said the two men were “like brothers” but got into an argument that turned physical. Jackson started to win the fight and hit Alphonse several times with a metal chair. 

When Alphonse stopped and turned his back, Jackson took a folding knife out of his back pocket and slashed him across the shoulder. Grabavac says Jackson turned to face him and Alphonse stabbed him two more times on the left side of his torso. The wound penetrated a lung and the left ventricle of his heart.

He died in a pool of his own blood.

Alphonse's lawyer Terry La Liberté told the jury Alphonse remembers little of the fight, but only took the knife out because he thought Jackson was going for another larger knife that had been on the counter most of the day.

After the stabbing, Alphonse left the residence but was arrested soon after. Police found a bloody knife in his back pocket.

The jury found him guilty of manslaughter and he will be sentenced at a later date. 

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