The trial for a Toronto couple accused of murdering their neighbour in Liberty Village last year entered its third day on Thursday, with the Crown attorney calling a woman from Vietnam who was staying with the couple at the time of the incident to testify.
Khoa Tran, 36, of Toronto is facing second-degree murder charges and his wife, Quynh (Isabelle) Nguyen, 30, is charged with being an accessory after the fact and doing an indignity to the body. Both have pled not guilty.
The charges stem from the death of Toronto filmmaker Reeyaz Habib, whose body was found in a trash compactor in a Liberty Village condo complex on June 8, 2025. He lived in a condo unit above Tran and Nguyen’s townhouse at 26 Western Battery Road.
The woman who was staying with the couple testified in court that she heard screaming on the night of June 6, 2025 and thought it was coming from the unit above.
Police paid a visit to Tran and Nguyen’s unit after the body was discovered and following that visit, the woman said the couple told her not to speak with police several times.
“They didn’t want the police to be suspicious because they [said they] are innocent – they didn’t know or do anything,” said the woman in court.
She added that they told her she has the right to remain silent, but if pushed, she should say that the three of them – Tran, Nguyen and herself – were sleeping in the same bedroom that night. However, she told the court only she and Nguyen were in the bedroom.
The woman said she felt “weird” about their request but agreed because she had “no choice.”
“I was living under their roof,” she said, adding that she had nowhere else to live or any other friends and family in the country.
Following Tran’s arrest, the woman moved out of the couple’s townhouse at the end of June because she felt uncomfortable living there, temporarily moving in with her employer who offered her space.
When asked what she believed Tran was arrested for, the woman said she didn’t know, but Nguyen told her they arrested the wrong person and they might mistakenly arrest her as well.
In chat conversations in the days after she moved out that were read in court, Nguyen repeatedly asked the woman to promise not to speak with police about Tran’s case and asked her to “just keep silent.”
In addition, Nguyen told the woman that police might threaten her or manipulate her psychologically and she might “blurt out” something that might lead to her arrest, so she advised her to speak to a lawyer and also record any phone conversation she might have with police.
More to come
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