WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

A forensic pathologist who has done 2,086 autopsies to date described in detail the stab wound that killed a 17-year-old boy on a Surrey bus in 2023 during a B.C. Supreme Court murder trial in New Westminster on Wednesday, Dec. 11.

Dr. Eric Bol did the autopsy in Burnaby Hospital's morgue on April 14, 2023, with Integrated Homicide Investigation Team police taking photographs.

to second-degree murder in the April 11, 2023 stabbing of a 17-year-old boy on a Surrey bus, at the outset of the 15-day trial that began Dec. 2 with Justice Terry Schultes presiding.

The trial heard that when police asked Mintenko what he would tell the teen's grieving mother, he replied "I f-ing killed him."

According to the Crown, at issue is whether he had a "specific intent" for murder. "As the court is aware, the Crown has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Mintenko intended to cause death or intended to cause bodily harm that he knew was likely to cause death and was reckless at to whether that ensued," Prosecutor Elise Kohno told Schultes.

The victim was stabbed in the right upper chest while riding on a Route 503 bus in the 9900-block of King George Boulevard and died in hospital. Schultes imposed publication bans on information that would identify the teen and two Crown witnesses. He also ordered a temporary publication ban on the identity of a fourth person. 

Bol told the court a knife blade with a single edge was thrust 17 centimetres (6.69 inches) through the hardest bony part of the victim's third rib into his right lung, damaging the pulmonary artery and pulmonary vein. No life-saving measures caused his death, the pathologist confirmed.

"I determined the cause of death to be a stab wound of the chest," he said. "In this case two major blood vessels were injured."

Bol testified during cross-examination that he was unable to speak to the amount of force needed to pierce a rib bone. "Not with any sort-of numerical value other than to say going through bone takes more force potentially than other substances in the body," he told the court.

The trial continues Monday, when the Crown expects to close its case.