'I feel broken': Cindy Gladue's family shares sorrow at sentencing hearing for 2011 death

Edmonton -

Crown prosecutors are seeking a sentence of between 18 and 20 years for an Ontario truck driver convicted of killing a woman who bled to death in an Edmonton hotel room. 

A sentencing hearing for Bradley Barton, 53, got underway Monday. 

In February, Barton was found guilty of manslaughter in the 2011 death of Cindy Gladue, a 36-year-old Métis and Cree woman.

Her body was found in a bathtub in Barton's hotel room at the Yellowhead Inn in June 2011. Court heard she bled to death after a wound to her vagina.

On Monday, court heard a number of victim impact statements, written by members of Gladue's family and read out by a family friend.

"I feel broken when I see my great grandchildren with their mothers, without my daughter and without their grandmother," read a statement from Donna McLeod, Gladue's mother. 

"I have spent every day for the last 10 years reliving the violent death of my daughter."

"You tore her body apart from the inside. A pain no woman should have to endure," read a statement from Prairie Adaoui, one of Gladue's cousins. 

"Our world is a much less kind and beautiful place without her." ​

In seeking a sentence of up to two decades, crown prosecutors argued Gladue was vulnerable and died of "sexual brutality," noting the nature of her injuries.

"It was death by genital mutilation."

Defence lawyer Dino Bottos will begin his sentencing submissions tomorrow.

Monday was the first of a scheduled three days for the hearing. It will continue Tuesday morning.

At trial, Crown prosecutors argued Barton caused the fatal wound when he sexually assaulted Gladue. Bottos argued Barton and Gladue had engaged in consensual sex acts.

Barton, a truck driver from Mississauga, Ont., has been tried twice in connection with Gladue's death. A jury found him not guilty in 2015 of first-degree murder.

The acquittal sparked rallies and calls for justice for Indigenous women across the country.

Both the Alberta Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada ordered a new trial.