Dartmouth manslaughter case adjourned until mid-December so woman's lawyers can review evidence

A Dartmouth manslaughter case has been adjourned until mid-December to allow the accused’s recently retained lawyers to obtain and review the evidence.

Kiara Marie Organ, 23, of no fixed address was arrested last month and charged in the December 2024 death of Jeffrey Alexander Emmerson, 56, at the former Geary Street homeless encampment in Dartmouth.

Halifax Regional Police responded to the encampment Dec. 22, 2024, after receiving a report that a man had been assaulted by a female. Paramedics were also dispatched, but the man declined medical attention.

Four days later, on Boxing Day, police were called back to the site and discovered the same man, Emmerson, dead inside a tent.

At the time, police said there was no obvious sign of foul play. But in June 2025, the provincial Medical Examiner Service informed police that autopsy findings indicated Emmerson’s death was a homicide.

Organ first appeared in court on the manslaughter charge Sept. 22 and appeared again Tuesday via a video link from jail.

Defence lawyer Brandon Rolle said he and a colleague at Nova Scotia Legal Aid, Anna Mancini, had just been retained by Organ.

Judge Alanna Murphy scheduled the case to return to court Dec. 16 for election and plea.

At the request of the defence, the judge remanded Organ to a federal facility so she can serve a prison sentence of just over two years that she received two weeks ago in Dartmouth provincial court. That sentence, imposed Oct. 15, was for dozens of offences, including sexual assault, common assault, resisting arrest, property mischief, 23 counts of theft, and 21 counts of breaching release conditions.

In November 2022, Organ was sentenced to two years in prison for a variety of offences, including robbery.

Halifax Regional Municipality closed the Geary Street encampment in June 2025.