ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — The photo was originally meant to be a joke, a way of showing the Butler brothers how ridiculous they looked when they were passed out after one of their drug binges.
Darlene Squires, a close friend of Philip Butler, 38, snapped the pic when she visited his C.B.S. home the morning of May 21, 2018. She had been stopping by his place on a daily basis, often cleaning up after Philip, his brother George and sometimes some friends went on a crack cocaine binge.
George, 43, had returned to the province about a month earlier, having lived away for some time. He spent a lot of time at Philip’s place and did a lot of crack, Squires said.
He preferred to shoot it up, while Philip chose to smoke it, she said.
That morning the house was in a worse state than usual, and the Butler brothers were in the middle of the living room, passed out on the floor. Squires had often joked to them that she’d take their picture the next time that happened, and this day was a Kodak moment too good to ignore: George, wearing a red T-shirt and jeans, was lying face down on the hardwood floor with his hands underneath him and one leg bent up. Philip, wearing pyjamas and wrapped in a blanket, was asleep with his head on his brother’s lower back.
“Gotcha boys,” Squires said she thought at the time. “I’m going to frame this one.”
Squires headed into the kitchen and filled the sink, then began picking up dishes to wash. When she went into Philip’s bedroom, she saw an even bigger mess, with dresser drawers pulled out and smashed, and clothing strewn everywhere. She snapped a photo of that, too, then decided to leave, thinking the brothers’ drug use had become too much.
Standing in the witness box in Newfoundland and Labrador Supreme Court in St. John’s Wednesday, Squires averted her eyes and grew emotional after taking a quick glance at the photo in prosecutor Scott Hurley’s hand.
“Yes, that’s it,” she said, identifying the photo of Philip and George as the one she had taken almost two years ago. She hadn’t known at the time she snapped the picture that George was dead.
Squires was the ninth witness called by Hurley and fellow prosecutor Alana Dwyer to testify at Philip’s second-degree murder trial.
The court had heard from Philip’s friend, Thomas Young, earlier in the day, who said he had received a call from Philip around 6 a.m. that day. He was still in bed at the time, but listened to the voicemail on his way to work a little later. The message was played for the jury Wednesday.
“Tommy, call me right away. This is Philip Butler,” a frantic-sounding voice said, leaving a phone number. “Call me right away.”
Squires said she returned to Philip’s house a couple of times to see if the brothers had gotten up. Around 2:30 p.m., she noticed George had not moved, though Philip was now asleep on the couch.
“I went over to him and tried to wake him up. I said, ‘Philip, I think there’s something wrong with George. I think he’s dead,’” Squires told the court. “Philip opened one eye and said, ‘What are you talking about? F--- off.’”
Squires said she left, but returned to pick Philip up after he texted and asked her to, saying, “I think I killed someone.” He asked her to take $300 out from an ATM to buy more crack. After smoking it in the car, he asked her to drop him off at his mother’s place so he could meet his other brother, Jonathan.
Jonathan Butler also testified in court Wednesday, clearly upset and nervous. When he first entered the courtroom he made it as far as the witness box before turning around and bolting back out.
He returned, one hand on his brow and breathing quickly, and sat in the box with his back to the Crown.
Jonathan told the court Philip had called and asked him to meet him at their mother’s place, and they sat on the back step and had a conversation.
Jonathan said he had not spoken to George in 20 years, explaining there had been “a very serious incident.”
“George is a man with no conscience,” Jonathan said. “He holds grudges and he hates — hated — me.”
Jonathan said Philip told him they had been “up to no good,” drinking and doing drugs, and spoke of their older brother’s animosity.
"I was in shock, I was concerned, and I thought maybe he was helping George set me up, bring me to the house. There’s disbelief when someone tells you they killed someone.” — Jonathan Butler
“He told me I didn’t have to worry about it anymore, because he had killed George,” Jonathan said.
Jonathan again rushed from the room during his testimony, crying and saying “Oh God.” In the prisoner’s dock, Philip sobbed, head in hands.
Jonathan later testified he hadn’t believed Philip until Philip showed him a photo on his phone of George lying on the floor in his house.
“Philip looked distraught,” Jonathan said. “He wasn’t looking too good. He asked me to drive him home and I was in shock, I was concerned, and I thought maybe he was helping George set me up, bring me to the house. There’s disbelief when someone tells you they killed someone.”
Dwayne Westcott, the Butlers’ step-brother, who was at the house mowing the lawn, drove Philip home. He also testified Wednesday.
“I said, ‘What’s up?’ and he said he and his brother got in a fight and he strangled him out,” Westcott said. “I didn’t really believe it at first.”
During the ride home, Philip made a phone call to what Westcott believed was the police, telling them to come to his address.
Through cross-examination of the witnesses by defence lawyers Karen Rehner and Tim O’Brien, the court heard more details of George’s drug use and his interactions with Philip before he died.
Westcott said he had seen drug paraphernalia in the basement room where George was staying.
Squires said George and Philip had something of a love-hate relationship, with Philip looking up to his older brother even though he was scared of him.
There were allegations of George working for the Hells Angels, and Squires said George once told her that he “might have had something to do with” a body recovered from St. John’s harbour in April 2018.
The body was that of Kevin O’Brien, who had testified at the murder trial of Anne Norris earlier in the year.
Squires said she was aware that George had stolen thousands of dollars from a family member in the weeks before he died, and Philip had convinced the loved one not to go to the police by saying he would help George pay the money back.
Philip slept with a metal pipe next to his bed for protection from his brother, Squires said.
“He was afraid (George) might go off his head if he took too much drugs,” she said.
She said Philip had warned George to stop injecting drugs, telling him his veins wouldn’t hold up much longer.
“Philip said, ‘I’ll have to revive you,’ and George said, ‘If you revive me, I’ll f---ing kill you,’” Squires testified.
The Crown intends to call its last two witnesses to the stand Thursday: a crime analyst with the RNC, who will speak about cellphones seized by police during the investigation into George’s death, as well as forensic pathologist Dr. Simon Avis, who conducted an autopsy in the days after George was killed.
Twitter: @tara_bradbury
