A botched gold-store heist, a gunshot and ‘unbearable’ pain

Dan Loewith couldn’t be in court Tuesday to face the man who used a handgun to shatter his life and the lives of the people who love him.

Loewith’s wife, Carol, told Ontario Court Justice Kevin McHugh her husband was in surgery while Dejan Stephen, 20, of Toronto, pleaded guilty to the violent robbery of the family’s jewelry store in east London.

It was Loewith’s 34th minor procedure to add to four major surgeries, the two times he’s needed dialysis for kidney failure, the one-on-one nursing care, physiotherapy, occupational therapy and respiratory therapy during the last eight months, four of which were on life support.

The 54-year-old owner of London Gold Buyer hasn’t left the hospital since Jan. 5, after Stephen and three masked men stormed Loewith’s store at 475 Highbury Ave. for a brazen morning armed robbery.

“Watching his pain has been unbearable,” his wife said. “My children and I have admitted we can’t think about how acutely he’s suffering in the hospital because it would grind our days to a total stop for the sheer incomprehensibility of it.”

Stephen pleaded guilty to armed robbery, assault causing bodily harm, aggravated assault and using a handgun during an indictable offense. McHugh accepted the joint sentencing submission from the Crown and the defense for seven years in prison. With pre-plea custody factored in, Stephen has six years left.

When Stephen pulled the trigger, the bullet entered Loewith’s chest, ruptured his kidney, filled his lungs with blood and damaged his diaphragm. He arrived at hospital close to death and his recovery has been slow and painful.

There have been an alarming number of serious medical setbacks, including a pulmonary embolism, necrotizing pneumonia and necrotizing pancreatitis. He has an open wound and endured “gaping surgeries from his sternum to his waist” that he told his wife hurt more than the gunshot wound.

He’s needed 73 units of blood products. His wife told McHugh, given the national blood inventory is dangerously low, “Dan would like to ask Mr. Stephen to consider donating blood in the future, if he is eligible.”

All of this suffering was the result of the botched robbery led by Stephen, a first-time offender, who comes from a stable background and left his family in shock when he was arrested.

His defense lawyer, Michael Barry, told McHugh Stephen “was in . . . bad company. He’s exposed to gang life, gun culture in the Toronto neighborhood where he is from. Some of his young teenage friends have been killed in gun crime.”

Barry acknowledged Stephen’s father in the courtroom, but Stephen’s young girlfriend chose to stay outside with their fussy, six-month old child. Stephen plans to reunite with them once he serves his time.

“I just want to apologize to my family, to the victim’s family,” Stephen said as he submitted a letter of apology to the court.

Assistant Crown attorney Meredith Gardiner said they traced the crime’s beginnings back to Nov. 11, when a red Toyota Corolla was stolen in Brampton.

The store’s surveillance cameras caught what happened on Jan. 5. The stolen car showed up at about 9:30 am, shortly after Loewith and his staff opened. It left, then returned four minutes later, parked facing Highbury Avenue, near the front door.

Stephen and two men, all wearing hoodies and masks, entered the store. Stephen pulled a gun out of his waistband and pointed it around the showroom. A second suspect had a duffle bag and pulled a gun from his hoodie pocket. The third suspect had a duffle bag.

Stephen immediately struck employee Judy DeOliviera on the back of the head with the butt of the gun. DeOliviera, who had her back turned, fell to the floor. She needed six staples to close the wound and she told McHugh she had head pain for five months, needed physical therapy and still suffers from memory loss and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Stephen and one of the suspects, with guns pointing, moved to Loewith’s office where Loewith was sitting behind his desk. Loewith was attempting to defend himself when Stephen fired.

Carol Loewith told the judge one of her husband’s doctors said that “he must have felt the gun against his body and turned at the last minute before the shot was fired. His quick thinking at that moment is what saved his life.”

“To hear that Dan knew he was about to be shot has shattered us,” she said.

Gardiner said the second armed suspect pointed his gun at another female staffer and demanded her cellphone. Other employees in the showroom watched the robbers smash showcases with a hammer and fill bags with jewelry. The second gunman put his weapon on the counter. The getaway driver fetched them and they took off.

Stealing the cellphone sealed their fate because the police tracked it. They found the Toyota abandoned on Fellner Avenue. The phone led them to Zorra Township in Oxford County, where the robbers were in a brown Honda Civic registered to one of them.

They tried to evade capture, but the driver was thwarted by a train at a crossing in Blandford-Blenheim Township. The driver made a U-turn toward pursuing officers, who drove the car into the ditch.

Four men, including Stephen, were arrested after a short struggle. An OPP officer retrieved two duffle bags containing $65,000 of stolen jewelry that were tossed from the car. A handgun with an automatic slide and a magazine clip with 31 rounds was under the passenger seat along with a stolen Rolex watch.

At police headquarters, Stephen confessed to the whole plot and “admitted to discharging the firearm and being shocked by the sound of it.”

“He advised that the robbery did not go as planned and they did not have intent to harm anyone,” Gardiner said.

But that hasn’t stopped the residual pain. While Loewith slowly recovers, his four children have put their post-secondary lives on the backburner. The family has forked out thousands of dollars for security costs. They had to pay to replace the shattered showcases, bloodied carpet and hole in the wall from the bullet that almost killed Loewith.

Carol Loewith said they fear it will happen again. Every day there are reports of jewelry stores across Ontario victimized by Toronto offenders “with no regard for the lives they endanger.”

McHugh, who acknowledged the “devastating” fallout, agreed. “I can say, as a judge sitting in this court on a daily basis, that it does seem to me that this community has been impacted by violent jewelry store robberies on a number of occasions in the last several years.”

He called Stephen “the primary mover” in the crime, but his early confession to the police, his guilty plea, his lack of record and his youth – he was just 19 – had to be considered.

“Good luck to you, Mr. Stephen,” McHugh said “Do your best to take whatever counseling is available to you in the institution. We don’t ever want to see you back here ever again.”

Three other people connected to the case remain before the court.

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