Dustin Ironquil in a photo from his graduation from the Academy of Learning.

By Alex McCuaig

Manslaughter sentencing

Eight-year sentence in 2018 Mayfair Manor homicide

Oct 23, 2020 | 5:32 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – The man responsible for the death of Dustin Ironquil was sentenced to eight-years in a federal penitentiary for manslaughter Friday during an emotional day for the friends and family of the 24-year-old Medicine Hat resident killed in 2018.

“It’s not fair. None of this is fair,” said Malvina John, mother of Ironquil outside the courthouse about her son’s homicide. “Nothing leading up to today is fair to me.”

Donald Goodwill, 25, was arrested in Saskatchewan on Dec. 14 and originally charged with second-degree murder after Ironquil’s body was found hidden in his apartment, five days after the man was killed, according to an agreed statement of facts.

In June, Goodwill entered a guilty plea to manslaughter.

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The court heard Ironquil and Goodwill were childhood friends who had grown up together in Lebret, Sask.

Ironquil had offered a down-on-his-luck Goodwill a place to stay at his Mayfair Manor apartment to help him out prior to the killing which took place sometime between the evening of Dec. 8 and morning of Dec. 9, 2018.

Ironquil had recently moved to the city to be closer to his now four-year-old son, and had been employed at the Academy of Learning as a facilitator after completing programming at the institution.

It’s believed Ironquil was killed with a golf club and stabbed after he and Goodwill drank heavily the evening of the homicide.

In his victim impact statement to the court, the dead man’s father, Richard Ironquil, addressed Goodwill directly.

“Donald, you stole him,” he said, “I struggle as to how you took the life of someone who was your best friend.”

Richard Ironquil had contacted police on Dec. 11 after his son failed to call him on his birthday the day before and told the court this action was unusual for his son.

Between Dec. 9 and Dec. 13, various other members of Ironquil’s family, friends and co-workers had tried to locate the man through Goodwill who provided concocted stories.

In her victim impact statement, Ironquil’s step-mother Noreen McLeod told the court of a loving man.

“Love for his family, his son, his friends,” McLeod said to Goodwill. “His love for you Donald.”

She told the court she still has good dreams of Ironquil, “only to wake up to the reality of this nightmare.”

Goodwill addressed the family at the end of the sentencing, telling them, “there won’t be a day I won’t think about the pain I’ve caused you.”

He went on to say, “I’m not expecting you to forgive me. I just want to let you know how deeply sorry I am.”

No motive for the killing was every revealed with Goodwill saying he blacked out during the homicide due to excessive drinking.

In handing down his eight-year jail term, Justice Vaughan Hartigan called the homicide brutal and vicious, aggravated by Goodwill killing a friend and the fact Ironquil’s son, “will have no memory of his father.”

Given time for pre-trial custody, Goodwill has five years remaining on his sentence.