OTTAWA — Canada’s highest court has upheld the 2022 second-degree murder conviction of Dillon Whitehawk in the 2020 death of Keesha Bitternose.
On May 21, Chief Justice Richard Wagner read the unanimous Supreme Court of Canada decision.
“We are all of the view to discuss the appeal,” he said.
One judge of the nine-judge panel disagreed. She would have allowed the conviction appeal, set aside the conviction, and ordered a new trial.
In October 2025, the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal upheld Whitehawk’s conviction after a majority of the three-judge panel found the trial judge’s reasons were sufficient and that she committed no error of law.
Two others were convicted in Keesha Bitternose’s death. Kelly Stonechild and Kurt Thomas pleaded guilty to manslaughter. They received prison sentences of seven and 18 years respectively.
Bitternose was 29 years old when she was murdered on Jan. 2, 2020. Her body was discovered at a home on Cameron Street in Regina. Court heard the assault against Bitternose was prolonged. Testimony from forensic pathologist Dr. Andreea Nistor said there were over 100 injuries caused by multiple instruments to Bitternose’s body. She was beaten and possibly stabbed in the basement, then managed to crawl upstairs – only to endure further assault before being killed in the kitchen of the home.
Third murder conviction appealed
This is the third second-degree murder conviction Whitehawk has appealed.
He successfully appealed his convictions of the murders of Scott Toto and Jordan Gaiton Denton.
In March, after a second trial, a jury convicted Whitehark of first-degree murder in Toto’s death and acquitted him in Denton’s murder. A first-degree murder conviction carries an automatic life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.
His retrial was held under extensive publication bans shielding the identities of five Crown witnesses. One witness is currently in the Saskatchewan Witness Protection Program, and others previously received threats after testifying in Whitehawk’s first trial. The court accepted the Crown’s assertion that the Indian Mafia street gang remains active in Regina and within correctional facilities, creating substantial risk of harm if cooperating witnesses are publicly identified, Court heard Whitehawk was a member of the Indian Mafia street gang.
The court also heard about the violent feud between the Indian Mafia (IM) and the Native Syndicate Killers (NSK) in late 2019. Multiple former IM members testified that Whitehawk carried out drive-by shootings as part of an effort to rise within the gang. Their accounts described Whitehawk firing from inside vehicles during late-night confrontations, targeting people he believed to be affiliated with rival gangs.
-With files from Ryan Kiedrowski
