Global Courant 2023-05-09 20:39:09
Two men found guilty of aggravated assault for a brutal assault on a Mississauga man were sentenced to six years in prison at a Brampton courthouse on Tuesday.
Brothers Janis Corhamzic and Adem Corhamzic were also sentenced to two years in prison for assaulting a friend of the victim who tried to intervene in the beating.
That time must be broken concurrently with the six-year sentence, meaning each man will serve a total of six years for both sentences.
The siblings were remanded in pre-trial detention following the sentencing.
Mohammed Abu Marzouk was severely beaten after leaving a summer picnic near the Mississauga Valley Community Center with his family on July 15, 2018.
Diana Attar, Marzouk’s wife, previously told CBC Toronto that two men walking behind the family’s car started yelling at them, “F-king Arab people! Terrorists.”
Victim’s wife said brothers were “ruthless.”
When Marzouk got out of the vehicle to talk to the men, one of the men punched him in the face. Attar saw a police car and ran to get help. But when she returned, Marzouk was lying on the ground, bleeding from his head and had lost consciousness. The family told CBC Toronto that he suffered multiple facial fractures along with cerebral hemorrhages.
In her victim impact statement to the court, Attar said at the time she “thought what did my husband do to deserve such treatment?”
“These perpetrators didn’t even interact on a human level,” she said. “They were merciless.”
In his victim impact statement filed in March in Superior Court, Marzouk said the incident and recovery were particularly difficult as a father. He shared that it caused emotional distress for his youngest daughter, saying it was “painful to see the impact my trauma had on her and to feel helpless in my ability to protect her”.
Judge: attack was ‘anti-Arab, but not anti-Muslim’
In January, the brothers were found guilty of aggravated assault but found not guilty of attempted murder in a judge-only trial. During that trial, the court heard from a police officer that the incident was the “most horrific event” he had ever witnessed.
He said he drew his gun because he thought the Marzouk brothers “could kill” and did not listen to instructions to “get on the ground”.
At a sentencing hearing in March, both siblings addressed the court, saying they felt remorse, shame and shame for being parents themselves. They said they had undergone anger management sessions and the attack was not motivated by hate.
Judge Fletcher Dawson said in his decision that the attack was “anti-Arab, but not anti-Muslim”, although he acknowledged the hateful nature of the incident. Dawson said he was not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that there was an intent to kill.
“That said, this was a close case,” he stated.
