Detainee charged for threatening judge
Joshua Daniel Grant Burden, 48, of Fredericton - who was facing break-in, sex assault and threat charges - now stands accused of trying to intimidate provincial court judge
A homeless man who ranted and cursed repeatedly at a judge during his last court appearance now stands charged of threatening that judge and trying to intimidate him.
Joshua Daniel Grant Burden, 48, of no fixed address, was remanded after a bail hearing June 19 on a variety of criminal charges.
The Fredericton Police Force have charged him with breaking into City Auto on Main Street and stealing a vehicle belonging to Nicolas McPhee on April 19; sexual assaulting a woman June 6; and uttering threats to Eric Lanteigne and Terri-Lynn Stewart at the Oak Centre and breaching a police undertaking barring him from communicating with the complainant in the sex-assault count, both June 7.
The woman’s name is protected by a court-ordered publication ban.
He also faces related counts of probation violation.
Burden proved to be a difficult defendant in his earlier court appearances this summer.
He was previously ordered to undergo a five-day psychiatric assessment while in custody at the Saint John Regional Correctional Centre, and on June 19, court heard that assessment deemed him fit to stand trial.
However, because of statements he made when appearing in Fredericton provincial court by video from the jail that day, Burden now faces new charges.
The new June 19 counts allege he uttered a threat to Judge Scott Brittain to cause him death and/or bodily harm, that he engaged in conduct aimed at provoking a state of fear in a justice system participant (namely, the judge) and that he breached his probation by doing so.
As he demanded to be released from custody on that date, he raged at the court. At one point, he told the judge, “If you keep fucking with me, you should be worried about what I’m going to do to you.”
After Brittain denied him bail last month, Burden said, “I’ll meet you in the parking lot at the courthouse and punch your fucking face off!”
Brittain was presiding over plea court again Monday, but Burden’s case was brought forward before Judge Lucie Mathurin in another courtroom instead, given the conflict of interest arising from the new charges.
Burden was scheduled to elect mode of trial and enter pleas Monday, but again, he ranted in court, trying to derail the proceedings.
He reiterated his name is now “Christopher Scott Kyle.”
That’s the name of a famed U.S. Navy SEAL and sniper Chris Kyle, whose 2012 autobiography, American Sniper, written after his honourable discharge from military service, was made into a movie of the same title, starring Bradley Cooper.
Kyle was murdered in 2013 by a former Marine with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Despite the earlier five-day assessment’s finding that Burden was fit, Mathurin ordered a more fulsome, 30-day psychiatric evaluation on fitness Monday.
She remanded Burden to the Restigouche Hospital Centre, a secure psychiatric facility in Campbellton that does most of the forensic psychiatric assessments in New Brunswick.
The judge ordered him to appear back before the court Aug. 10 to review the results of the new assessment.
Don MacPherson can be contacted at ftonindependent@gmail.com.