{"id":640583,"date":"2026-05-01T10:42:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T10:42:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/640583\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T10:42:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T10:42:18","slug":"former-rcmp-officer-who-killed-lover-has-sentence-reduced-saskatoon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/640583\/","title":{"rendered":"Former RCMP officer who killed lover has sentence reduced – Saskatoon"},"content":{"rendered":"

A former RCMP<\/a> officer convicted of killing his younger lover who lived with him and his wife for about a year has had his sentence reduced.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Former Saskatchewan RCMP officer Bernie Herman<\/a> saw his sentence<\/a> for killing 26-year-old Braden Herman reduced by three years this week, after a ruling by the province\u2019s court of appeal. There was a 26-year age difference between the two men.<\/p>\n

The decision, released on Thursday, comes almost two years after the former Mountie was sentenced to 11 years in prison. In its decision, the court determined the trial judge made errors in principle and reduced that sentence to eight years.<\/p>\n

The two men were not related, despite sharing the same last name, and were having an intimate relationship before Braden Herman\u2019s naked body was found in a park on the outskirts of Prince Albert, Sask.<\/p>\n

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During the trial, Bernie Herman testified he fired the gun that killed Braden after he felt threatened. The court heard Bernie Herman was abused by Braden Herman who was half his age.<\/p>\n

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The police officer was first charged with first-degree murder, which was later downgraded to second-degree murder. He was acquitted of second-degree murder, but found guilty of manslaughter in January 2024.<\/a><\/p>\n

In his sentencing, the trial judge said there was an element of self-defence to Bernie Herman\u2019s actions, saying there was an \u201cimmediate threat of bodily harm.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the judge rejected his claim that he was acting in self-defence when he shot the 26-year-old, and denied his defence of provocation as well.<\/p>\n

Justice Gary Meschishnick said he didn\u2019t believe Bernie Herman\u2019s testimony that he felt threatened by the younger man. But he had reasonable doubt about whether the Mountie could have been provoked and lost his cool.<\/p>\n

At sentencing, Meschishnick said though the former officer was \u201cconsistently abused and blackmailed\u201d by the younger man, he chose to stay in the relationship.<\/p>\n

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In addition to appealing his sentence, which led to it being reduced, Bernie Herman also appealed his conviction.<\/p>\n

The Appeal Court agreed with the trial judge that it was not a case of self-defence; it also agreed provocation was a factor. As a result, they rejected the former RCMP officer\u2019s conviction appeal.<\/p>\n

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At the time, Crown prosecutors had argued for a life sentence during sentencing submissions following Bernie Herman\u2019s trial.<\/p>\n

They went on to appeal the second-degree murder acquittal, saying provocation should not have been used in the trial judge\u2019s decision. The court rejected the appeal, citing evidence that provocation could be considered.<\/p>\n

The Court of Appeals also cited several mitigating factors in favour of a lower sentence, including no previous criminal record, a pro-social lifestyle and supports, his service to the community as an RCMP officer with good work record, and a low risk to reoffend.<\/p>\n

Bernie Herman will now serve a total of seven years, two months and nine days, taking into account a pre-sentence credit prior to his original sentence.<\/p>\n

\u2014with files from Global News\u2019 Andrew Benson and The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A former RCMP officer convicted of killing his younger lover who lived with him and his wife for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":640584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[239037,239038,49,48,2169,44,920,239039],"class_list":["post-640583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-bernie-herman","tag-bernie-herman-sentencing","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-crime","tag-news","tag-rcmp","tag-saskatchewan-mountie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}