'That is not justice,' says mother of Jannai Dopwell-Bailey after youth handed 6 years for killing son

The mother of Jannai Dopwell-Bailey, the 16-year-old who was fatally stabbed outside of his Montreal high school three years ago, says she's been handed a harsher sentence than the youth who killed him.

On Monday, a young man convicted of second-degree murder in the teen's death was sentenced to six years minus time served, leaving him two more years in custody and three years under supervision in the community. 

"That is not justice. He's going to come out of jail, live his life and I am going to go on forever and ever until I die, until I meet my son again, grieving for my child," said Charla Dopwell. 

"I'm getting a life sentence." 

The identity of the teen, now 19, is protected by a publication ban because he was a minor at the time of the killing.

WATCH | Jannai's mother says youth should have been tried as adult: 

'I'm getting a life sentence,' says mother of slain teen after youth sentenced to 6 years

2 months ago

Duration 0:39

Charla Dopwell, the mother of 16-year-old Jannai Dopwell-Bailey who was fatally stabbed three years ago, says the youth involved in his killing should have been given a life sentence instead of the six years he was handed on Monday. Another man involved in the teen's death was sentenced to life in prison.

The offender was 16 when he and a man named Andrei Donet, then 18, beat, pepper-sprayed and stabbed Jannai to death outside of his high school in the west-central Côte-des-Neiges neighbourhood on Oct. 18, 2021. 

In June, Donet, now 21, was sentenced to life in prison with no eligibility for parole before 13 years for the second-degree murder of the teenager.

In Canada, a second-degree murder conviction comes with an automatic life sentence with no possibility of parole before 10 years to a maximum of 25 years. For youth, the maximum sentence is seven years with a maximum of four years in custody and the remainder spent in the community under supervision.

Dopwell says the youth's punishment doesn't fit the crime in her son's case. 

"He did adult stuff, so he should be sentenced as an adult," she said. 

'He's always in my heart'

Sitting in her home in Côte-des-Neiges, where the walls are adorned with her son's photos and accolades, Dopwell says it's difficult to make changes around the house. 

"I tried to take [the photos] down and put them in his room ... but I can't look at my son and take his pictures down. I can't do it," she said.  

Even his room, where Dopwell says she visits "all the time" to speak to him and pray, has remained unchanged since he died.

"I wanted it to be just like how he left it," she said.

Sometimes, she says, his death doesn't feel real, "like I'm going to get up one day and see Jannai." She described him as a healthy young boy full of life, who loved to dance and play video games. 

Dopwell says she can't help imagine the kind of man her son would be today at 19. According to her rules, he'd be two years shy of being allowed to get a tattoo. 

Displaying the side of her neck, where a prominent "Jannai" is forever printed with a heart, Dopwell says it was something she could do for him — something to help in the healing process.

"One day I'm OK, the next day I'm sad. I'm always thinking of him and I know he's gone … but I miss him so much and he's always in my heart and in my mind."