A sniffling teenager convicted of first-degree murder for relentlessly pressuring her boyfriend to kill a perceived rival told her sentencing hearing she takes responsibility for "her part."
"I want to say I'm very sorry for anything I said or did to contribute to Stefanie (Rengel's) death," M.T. told the court on Friday, reading from a one-page statement and crying as she spoke.
"I take full responsibility for my part. I know it's hard for you to believe, but every day I wish I could go back in time and change everything I said and have Stefanie be alive with her family again."
Rengel's mother and younger brother were in the courtroom.
The 17-year-old can't be fully identified due to provisions in the Youth Criminal Justice Act. She did not take the stand at her trial, which is the right of all defendants.
The Crown wants her sentenced as an adult for her crime, meaning she would get life in prison with no possibility of parole for five to seven years. Once paroled, she would be under the supervision of the courts for the rest of her life.
If sentenced as a young offender, she would get a 10-year sentence. Six years would be spent in closed custody and four more would be living in the community in what's known as open custody.
Crown prosecutor Robin Flumerfelt argued in court that M.T.'s words fell far short of taking responsibility for her role in the 14-year-old Rengel's New Year's Day 2008 death by stabbing. "Her attitude has not changed."
D.B., M.T.'s boyfriend at the time, carried out the attack, stabbing Rengel six times and leaving her to die. He has pleaded guilty and will be sentenced this fall.
But it happened after M.T. had relentlessly badgered him for months to kill Rengel, with whom D.B. had once briefly been involved.
"I want her dead ... lol we've been through this ... If it takes more than a week then we're just going to be friends," M.T. told him in one notorious text message.
The Crown argued that the seriousness of the crime and the planned nature of the murder called for an adult sentence by the court.
"This murder was not about Stefanie Rengel," Flumerfelt said. "This murder was about M.T. and her murderous heart."
During the trial, the Crown entered more than 30,000 pages of instant messaging transcripts into evidence.
Defence lawyer Marshall Sack argued the incessant messaging is just evidence of M.T.'s obsessive personality traits, adding the murder itself wasn't planned at all.
However, one witness testified she had seen D.B. skulking outside the home of Rengel's family on the day before the murder. He was constantly using a cellphone at that time.
Sack argued that M.T. only uttered words in the lead-up to Rengel's murder.
On Dec. 17, 2007, M.T. told D.B.: "ur getting blocked until u kill her". She told a friend she had sex with D.B. when he came to her home on the night of the killing and told her he had finally murdered Rengel.
Psychiatrists for the defence and prosecution have examined M.T.
The Crown's expert said she could evolve into someone like the dangerously obsessive character portrayed by actor Glenn Close in the 1987 movie "Fatal Attraction."
However, he conceded such an outcome isn't a foregone conclusion.
"Glenn Close in that movie was a psychopath," Sack told reporters. "Didn't she boil bunny rabbits? It is nothing like this young girl."
The defence's expert disputed the Crown psychiatrist's assessment, but he did agree that what M.T. told him about the murder was much milder than what she had told police in an interview conducted hours after the killing.
When asked in that interview why she didn't call 911 or tell her parents after D.B. admitted to killing Rengel, M.T. told police, "I don't know."
Justice Ian Nordheimer said he will pass sentence on July 28.
With a report from CTV Toronto's James Macdonald and files from The Canadian Press
