There were dramatic rescues, a UFO yarn, fentanyl fears, tragedies and crimes, but the most popular story on CBC Manitoba's website in 2017 was a Hollywood star's surprise appearance at a Winnipeg wedding reception.
The story about Kristen Stewart crashing the party received over 120,000 more page views than the second-most viewed story — about Vince Li being granted an absolute discharge.
'We got to be formally introduced before they came in and partied with us' - Kayleigh Jennings
Stewart was shooting a movie in the city during the summer when she met the owner of Pizzeria Gusto at an event. Not long after, the 27-year-old actress, who was Isabella (Bella) Swan in the Twilight vampire films, decided to drop into the Academy Road pizzeria.
Newlyweds Kirsten and Kayleigh Jennings had rented the restaurant for their reception, so managers asked the couple if Stewart and her model girlfriend Stella Maxwell could come in for a few drinks.
"We got to be formally introduced before they came in and partied with us. We got a chance to shake her hand and shake Stella's hand," Kayleigh told CBC News at the time.
The couple said Stewart and Maxwell blended in as "two normal girls" who hung out until about 1 a.m., having drinks, dancing and requesting songs.
Once news of the A-list interlopers got out, the intimate event was suddenly in a global spotlight.
- See the TMZ video
It was reported by celebrity gossip sites like Exclaim, Perez Hilton, Buzzfeed, TMZ, Tribute, Vanity Fair, In Style and the Hollywood Reporter, as well as United Kingdom-based websites for the Daily Mail and the Telegraph.
Mental illness and culpability
The full release of Vince Li, the man found not criminally responsible for beheading Tim McLean on a Greyhound bus in July 2008, also received a lot of attention as it renewed a debate on mental illness and culpability.
Will Baker walks free after the Manitoba Criminal Code Review Board granted his absolute discharge. (CBC)
Li, who now goes by the name Will Lee Baker, was found to be suffering from untreated schizophrenia when he killed McLean on the bus about 30 kilometres west of Portage la Prairie on the Trans-Canada Highway.
He spent seven years in treatment at the Selkirk Mental Health Centre before moving to Winnipeg to be treated at Health Sciences Centre. On Feb. 10, 2017, the Manitoba Criminal Code Review Board granted the discharge, allowing Baker to live with no conditions on his freedom.
'We have to … recognize that we've made a decision as a civilized country that we don't punish people who really didn't know what they were doing at the time of the offence' - Isabel Grant
The decision was met with criticism from some, including Matt Logan, a former RCMP officer and forensic psychologist, who suggested a conditional discharge would have been better, with requirements for Baker's continued surveillance by mental health professionals.
"The deinstitutionalizing of people with mental illnesses and putting them into the public and leaving them to the criminal justice to monitor — I think we have to have a lot of discussion about this yet," he said at the time.
But Isabel Grant, a professor who specializes in criminal and mental health law, disagreed. Rehabilitation of offenders, while it can feel painfully unfair to people affected by violence, is the goal, she said.
"We have to … recognize that we've made a decision as a civilized country that we don't punish people who really didn't know what they were doing at the time of the offence, and really didn't know that they were doing something wrong."
Asylum seekers head north
Manitoba's border towns experienced a sudden, if temporary, surge in population early in the new year.
As newly minted U.S. President Donald Trump took office and signed an executive order halting all refugee admissions and temporarily barring people from seven Muslim-majority countries, many people fearing deportation headed north to Canada for asylum.
Farhan Ahmed, left, and another refugee say they couldn't feel their fingers or their toes during their journey across the U.S. border into Manitoba in February. (Tyson Koschik/CBC)
In dangerously cold temperatures, refugee hopefuls trudged through snowy fields and gravel roads under the cover of night, sneaking across the Canada-U.S border.
The stories of their struggles against the elements gripped Manitobans, who know well enough the cold of a Prairie winter.
"I couldn't feel my hands. I couldn't feel my hands. It was hard." - Farhan Ahmed
On one weekend in February, 22 people crossed over near Emerson, about 100 kilometres south of Winnipeg.
Farhan Ahmed was one of them, part of a group that included a family with children. Facing exhaustion and the onset of frostbite, they finally called 911 for help.
The RCMP took them to a Canada Border Services Agency location where they could make refugee claims.
"They gave us heat. If we didn't get that — I couldn't feel my hands. I couldn't feel my hands. It was hard," Ahmed told CBC News.
Those three stories topped the most-viewed in 2017.
Top stories of 2017
Here are links to the rest of of the stories that round out the year's top 25.
Jan Lambourne, left, from Teulon, Man., reunites with Justin Uhart, who helped rescue her during the October shooting massacre at a music festival in Las Vegas. (CBC)
Conor Sykes and his six-year-old son, Liam, went on a canoe trip one morning in May but never returned. Their bodies were later found, along with that of a friend and his son. (Lindsay Catherine Rose Sykes/Facebook)
Stefan Michalak was treated at a hospital for burns to his chest and stomach after something happened in the woods near Falcon Lake on May 20, 1967. The unexplained event soon become known as the Falcon Lake incident and remains Canada's most famous UFO encounter.
