Whistler visitor watched suspect with gun run from murder scene

Car associated with Whistler murder suspects Photo by Submitted /jpg

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For Lower Mainland resident Erin Best, a 2022 summer vacation in Whistler was interrupted by the sounds of gunshots and the sight of an armed suspect hopping into a getaway vehicle.

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Best was staying at the Pan Pacific Mountainside Hotel with her friend Victoria Dickinson when the shooting began at the neighbouring Sundial Hotel just after noon on July 24, 2022.

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Best testified Thursday at the B.C. Supreme Court murder trial of Gursimran Sahota and Tanvir Khakh, who are charged with the fatal shootings that day of Meninder Dhaliwal and Satindera Gill.

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Best said she was on the patio of her sixth-floor room when she heard “a loud bang.” Her friend had gone to do laundry.

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“I didn’t think too much of the loud noise until I heard several more loud bangs, which then it became evident that I was hearing gunshots,” Best told 12 jurors and Justice Miriam Gropper.

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“I looked over the railing to see what was happening below, facing the Sundial Crescent, and I could hear several gunshots and people screaming, and I saw people running away from the Sundial Hotel.”

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She said she also saw “a person running from the Sundial Hotel along the road toward the Pan Pacific Hotel that I was situated in, and that person had a gun in their hand.”

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Best said she grabbed her iPhone to try to record what she saw. At that moment, Dickinson returned to the room.

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“I called out to Ms. Dickinson: ‘Those were gunshots’ and stepped back onto the patio. Ms. Dickinson followed me up onto the patio as I unlocked my phone and I began to record what I was seeing,” Best testified. “The person with the gun veered toward a car that pulled up beside them, entered the car, and the car headed up Sundial Crescent toward Blackcomb Way.”

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She said she lost sight of the vehicle when it “went behind a bush,” but assumed it turned left away from Whistler Village, as she would have seen it again if it had turned right.

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At that point, she stopped recording and called 911.

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Best estimated that she heard up to 10 gunshots and later saw one of the victims lying on ground near the entrance to the Sundial Hotel.

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“(The shots) were several very close together. I would say possibly up to 10, maybe less, between six and 10, and it was difficult to hear whether it was one gun being fired or multiple,” she said.

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The short video Best recorded was played in court. It showed a grey Honda SUV quickly drive past her on Sundial Crescent before being obscured by foliage.

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In her opening submissions, Crown prosecutor Fatemeh Nejatali said that evidence would show that a vehicle found in another Whistler neighbourhood shortly after the shooting “matched descriptions of the car used by the two gunmen to flee the scene of the shooting.”

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Two guns were later recovered from the Honda, she said.

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Best also said she couldn’t describe the suspect’s appearance, given her perspective from the sixth floor.

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“I can’t recall the exact type of clothing that they were wearing. I do remember that they were holding a gun in their hand, and I was fairly certain I had observed some black gloves behind that gun,” she said. 

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The trial is expected to last three weeks.

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