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Suspect in Renee Sweeney murder seeking bail for third time

Robert Steven Wright will have a bail review in mid-December
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Robert Steven Wright is charged with second-degree murder for the

Robert Steven Wright is trying for a third time to get bail.

Wright, 42, appeared via CCTV from Sudbury Jail on Tuesday. He is represented by Toronto lawyer Michael Lacy.

A bail application will be heard Dec. 17, court heard. It is expected to take one day and will happen virtually.

This will be Wright’s third attempt at bail. In May 2020, Superior Court Justice Edward Gareau rejected Wright’s bail application for a number of reasons.  

With a tentative trial date set for Sept. 12, 2022, Lacy told the court he is hoping to firm up that date when Wright’s matter returns to assignment court in January.

The trial had been scheduled to start in October this year but was postponed because Wright changed lawyers only a few weeks prior to the start of trial. 

Wright also contracted COVID-19 recently as part of the outbreak at Sudbury Jail, which closed the facility for weeks and sent inmates to other locations in Ontario.

Pretrial dates have also been set for the week of March 21 and April 25. 

Wright was arrested in December 2018 and charged with first-degree murder in the brutal 1998 killing of 23-year-old Renée Sweeney. The charge was downgraded to second-degree murder.

Sweeney was brutally attacked at her workplace; an adult video store on Paris Street, where she sustained multiple stab wounds and succumbed to her injuries. 

Wright was 18 years old at the time of the murder and was a resident of Sudbury and a student at Lockerby Composite School.

Wright was arrested at North Bay Regional Health Centre. He worked as a laboratory technician.


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Arron Pickard

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