Canada's top court upheld the first-degree murder conviction Friday of a Cape Dorset man who gunned down an RCMP officer in the Nunavut community eight years ago.

In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal by Salomonie Jaw, who was convicted by a jury in the shooting death of Const. Jurgen Seewald, 47, in Cape Dorset on March 5, 2001.

At the time, Seewald was responding to a domestic dispute between Jaw and his common-law wife at Jaw's home. The two men argued, and Seewald used pepper spray on Jaw in an attempt to subdue him before Jaw shot Seewald in the abdomen with a shotgun.

Since Jaw was convicted in 2004, he has been serving a life sentence in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years. Going to the Supreme Court of Canada was his last chance to get a new trial.

In Iqaluit, Crown prosecutor Susanne Boucher said she was pleased to hear most of the Supreme Court justices upheld the first-degree murder conviction.

"This is now closure on this case, for the families and colleagues and the community, for officer Jurgen Seewald," Boucher told CBC News on Friday.

Question of intent

In appealing the first-degree murder verdict, Jaw's lawyers argued that the trial judge failed to give fair instructions to the jury.

The lawyers said Justice John Vertes had erred by asking the jury to decide whether shooting Seewald was accidental or intentional, but did not ask them to consider whether Jaw was acting in self-defence or was provoked.

They also argued that Vertes should have told the jury that Seewald was not on duty at the time of the incident, and therefore a conviction of second-degree murder would have been possible.

The Nunavut Court of Appeal dismissed Jaw's appeal in May 2008, but one of the three Appeals Court judges disagreed with the ruling based on a question of law.

That question of law automatically triggered a review of the appeal by the Supreme Court of Canada.

The dissenting Nunavut judge argued that Vertes's instructions were lacking on how the jury could interpret Jaw's conduct after the shooting.

During the trial, Vertes noted the Crown's argument that Jaw must have known he shot Seewald because "he did not even bother to check" the officer's condition afterwards.

7-2 decision

Of the nine Supreme Court justices who heard the case, seven agreed that Vertes did not err in his charge to the jury, although they said Vertes had "somewhat misconstrued" the Crown's reasons for pointing out Jaw's post-offence conduct.

Writing for the majority, Justice Louis LeBel conceded that Vertes may have "somewhat misconstrued" the Crown's reasons for pointing out Jaw's post-offence conduct, but he added that it was one small mistake in an otherwise faultless charge to the jury.

"There is no suggestion that the verdict was not reasonably supported by the evidence or that the jury was swayed by this misstatement in a way that could have resulted in an unfair trial," LeBel's ruling stated in part.

But Justices Morris Fish and William Binnie disagreed, arguing that Jaw should get a new trial because they believe Vertes had "misdirected the jury" by twice suggesting that they consider Jaw's conduct after the shooting in deciding whether he intended to shoot Seewald.