A teen who assaulted two workers at the Behavioural Health Foundation in Selkirk, Man. last spring has been given an adult sentence.

Lionel Harper, 17, who court heard was the main player in the attack was sentenced to six years in prison. Harper previously pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated assault which left Jackie Healey and her coworker with lasting physical injuries and emotional trauma.

Judge Dale Schille told court the level of violence involved is at the upper-end of the spectrum.

“This particular offence stands apart in the extreme level of the violence, as well as the gratuitous nature of the violence,” Schille said. “It is approaching what the courts recognize as an offence of stark horror.”

Healey, who has permanent vision loss in her left eye due to the attack, wasn’t in court Thursday morning but her sister, father and mother were in attendance on her behalf.

Her dad John Healey said his daughter was too traumatized to sit through the court proceedings, but he said Jackie was “quite pleased” with the sentence.

“At least it was adult sentencing,” John said. “She wasn’t really up to coming. She wasn’t doing that well the last few days…I guess worried about the sentencing and everything, facing him and that, so she decided not to come.”

Court heard Healey and her coworker were caring for Harper and a co-accused during the evening of May 29, 2016.

Crown attorney Lisa Carson told court prior to the attack, the two boys, who were the only ones at the facility, had planned to steal a vehicle but took things much further than that.

Court heard the attack happened at around 7 p.m. inside the facility, and that Healey’s coworker was downstairs with the boys while Jackie was upstairs.

Carson told court Harper ran at the worker with a sock and something inside of it believed to be a pool ball.

“He began hitting her over and over,” Carson told court. “She fell to the ground a few times and kept seeing stars.”

“She pretended she was dead and didn’t move again.”

Carson told court the boys eventually went upstairs and that’s when Healey was assaulted. However. she doesn’t know who attacked her or what happened.

“She came to in a big pool of blood,” Carson told court.

Healey barricaded herself in an office until police arrived, while her coworker ran for help at a home on the grounds of the facility.

In Healey’s victim impact statement, read out in court by the Crown, she said losing her vision was the hardest part.

“For Lionel it probably started and ended on that night. For me it was just a little piece of the beginning of a horrible life change,” Healey wrote. “This person had me fooled, thinking he was a nice young man when in fact he was the devil in disguise.”

The six-year sentence was a joint recommendation.

Schille endorsed the sentence, but told court it was in no way towards the upper-end of the range of what might be anticipated.

The judge said Harper’s upbringing had to be taken into account.

Court heard he was exposed to violence and substance abuse as a child, and was bullied in school for being poor.

“You have been disadvantaged as an aboriginal person in all the classic ways that are recognized by the courts,” Schille said. “I have no hesitation in accepting that as a fair and appropriate sentence.”

With 18 months credit for time served, Harper has four-and-a-half years remaining on his sentence.