How the Vancouver Missing Women Task Force caught Canada’s worst serial killer

Gazette - Snaring Pickton

by Caroline Ross


On February 5, 2002, rookie Cst Nathan Wells of the Port Coquitlam RCMP Street Enforcement Unit executed his second-ever search warrant at a pig farm outside Vancouver, B.C. Two members of the Vancouver Missing Women Task Force (MWTF) stood by off-site. Wells and his unit colleagues were looking for a firearm. The MWTF was looking for a needle in a haystack. The task force — a joint RCMP–Vancouver Police initiative — was investigating the disappearances of some 50 women from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. The farm was on the radar because it belonged to one of the task force’s 60 persons of interest. The task force was hoping for a break. It got one.

In a trailer owned by Robert “Willie” Pickton, the search team found identification and a prescription inhaler belonging to two women who had recently gone missing from the Downtown Eastside. It was the first crack in the case against Pickton, who would later become Canada’s worst alleged serial killer, charged with the first-degree murders of 27 women whose remains or DNA were found on the farm.*

How did the MWTF arrive at this critical break? It wasn’t luck, says Don Adam, the now-retired RCMP inspector who headed the MWTF until November 2004. It was sound methodology and solid teamwork that cracked the case — that and a willingness to assess the costs and benefits of every decision upon which the investigation was founded.

Back to the beginning

In December 2000, Don Adam faced a puzzle. He had been asked to lead an initiative to jump-start a stalled Vancouver Police Department (VPD) investigation into the disappearances of 27 women from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, a notorious hangout for sex trade workers and drug users.

The facts of the case were as follows: The VPD was looking for a serial killer — the same man who behavioural science research indicated had murdered another three women in 1995, dumping their remains off logging roads in the Fraser Valley. This “Fraser Valley killer” had left his own DNA at the crime scene, and the VPD was using that DNA profile to eliminate suspects in the Downtown Eastside investigation. VPD officers reported that no women had disappeared from the Downtown Eastside since 1999. The officers were running a historical investigation, working their suspects hard, but getting nowhere.

“When you’re faced with an enormous problem like this, the first thing to do is (conduct) an investigation of the investigation,” says Adam. “Don’t try and find the killer. Try and find out whether you believe (the previous investigators) followed a methodology that will ensure all your bases are covered.”

Adam and a small review team of RCMP and VPD officers spent the next several months assessing the foundations of the two-year-old VPD investigation. They took nothing for granted, and as such, they uncovered a few structural flaws.

False logic

The first weak point was the link between the Downtown Eastside disappearances and the Fraser Valley killings, says Adam. The Valley women had been dumped along accessible logging roads, whereas the Downtown Eastside women had all disappeared without a trace.

“If you (as a killer) have had 27 completely successful disappearances, why would you leave these three (bodies) to be found, when, by putting in a little extra effort to take them another three feet and roll them down a ravine, they could have been gone forever?” says Adam. “It didn’t make sense.”

The review team thus rejected the behavioural science link as too limiting on the investigation. “We decided not to accept that our killer was (also) the (killer) from the Fraser Valley,” says Adam. “That meant we were going back to square one.”

But the team was further ahead than they could know at the time. Pickton, who had actually been eliminated as a suspect based on the Fraser Valley DNA profile, was now back in the suspect pool — and flagged as such on Canada’s national police computer system. One year later, Cst Wells would see that flag while preparing his firearms search warrant, and he would contact the MWTF to stand by during his search on February 5.

“When you’re faced with an enormous problem like this, the first thing to do is (conduct) an investigation of the investigation."
Don Adam

Widening the net

The review team also questioned the decision to run a historical investigation. Assuming that the killer had gone to ground would completely close the door on the possibility that he was still active in some way — any way — even if it wasn’t murder.

“When killers are operating in the here and now, they will be making mistakes,” says Adam. “(As an investigator), you need to be very tuned in to any leads on similar types of offences — in our case, attempted abductions and new missing (women) — so that you can insert your task force into those investigations immediately.”

The review team wasn’t willing to accept the logic of a historical investigation until it had reviewed every bit of evidence associated with the case. Therefore, when the MWTF was officially launched in September 2001, investigators were already operating on two fronts: on one front, a section was reviewing and culling the historical files; on the other front, a section was working in the present tense, actively seeking new leads or fresh evidence that might unveil the killer. In hindsight, this multifaceted approach paid off.

Closing the noose

Throughout 2001, task force members identified another 18 women who had disappeared from the Downtown Eastside since 1999. Two of those women would provide the MWTF with its break on the farm on February 5. When human remains were unearthed months later, the victims’ identities were confirmed through familial DNA profiles that the MWTF had persevered in gathering and submitting to the Vancouver Forensic Laboratory’s DNA Data Bank.

Task force members were also actively investigating leads on sexual assaults, other assaults and abductions within their victim pool. The unit re-submitted old exhibits for DNA testing, became involved in new offences linked to their key suspects, and alerted municipal police forces to their expanded focus — hence their attendance at Wells’ weapons search on February 5.

Even without the break at the farm, says Adam, the team was slowly closing in on Pickton. Task force members were out on the streets, tracking sex trade workers and looking for any hint of suspect activity. The team knew that victims were still being taken from the Downtown Eastside at a rate of approximately one every six weeks, and investigators were closely examining the habits and acquaintances of the missing women. Prior to February 2002, members had identified a female subject who had transported a recently missing sex trade worker out of the city. Later, after the February 5 search, investigators would closely link this female to Pickton.

“The way we were operating, we absolutely would have got Pickton,” says Adam, noting that the entire MWTF team was focused, committed and willing to think critically from the get-go.

“The fact that Nathan Wells, a young member obtaining his second search warrant, got us on the farm — that was luck. The fact that we were there on the farm (in the first place), that’s good policing. We positioned ourselves to win.”

Sit back and assess every step you take until you’re 100 per cent certain it won’t cost you down the road.

Lessons for the future

At the end of the day, Adam has one piece of advice for any new task force faced with similarly complex missing persons’ cases: sit back and assess every step you take until you’re 100 per cent certain it won’t cost you down the road.

“In these tough investigations, we (as investigators) are desperate for anything to help give form to the investigation,” says Adam. Behavioural science, past investigative decisions, investigators’ “instincts” — all can provide form and direction, but they must be backed by sound methodology, says Adam. Otherwise, you risk casting your net too shallow, or in the wrong pond, and your investigation will sink while the target swims away.

*In December 2007, Pickton was convicted of six counts of second-degree murder. He awaits trial on 20 counts of first-degree murder. A 21st count was terminated by the trial judge.


http://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/gazette/vol72n2/crime1-eng.htm

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Pickton appeal hearing set for next March 25 in nation’s top court

Thursday, September 17th, 2009 | 1:50 pm

Canwest News Service

VANCOUVER – The Supreme Court of Canada has set a tentative date of next March 25 to begin hearing the appeal of serial killer Robert (Willie) Pickton.

Pickton, 56, was convicted on Dec. 9, 2007, of six counts of second-degree murder involving women who disappeared from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside: Mona Wilson, Brenda Wolfe, Sereena Abotsway, Andrea Joesbury, Marnie Frey and Georgina Papin.

He still faces trial on another 20 counts of first-degree murder, but the Crown does not plan to proceed on that second trial if Pickton’s convictions are upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada.

Still, the 20-count indictment was in court today and the second trial has been set to begin Sept. 13, 2010.

The date was set anticipating it may take months for a ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada on Pickton’s appeal.

Last June 25,the B.C. Court of Appeal denied Pickton’s bid for a new trial, but a dissseting judgment by one judge of the three-judge panel gave Pickton an automatic right to appeal his case before the nation’s highest court in Ottawa.

In a 2-1 split decision, Chief Justice Lance Finch and Richard Low turned down Pickton’s bid for a new trial, largely rejecting many of the defence arguments.

The Crown, Pickton’s defence had argued on appeal, pursued a theory during the trial that Pickton had acted alone, but as a result of a question by the jury during deliberations switched gears and suggested he could have had an accomplice.

Pickton’s defence also alleged the trial judge, B.C. Supreme Court Justice James Williams, erred in his response to a jury question.

However, Justice Ian Donald disagreed with his colleagues, saying that Williams made “a serious error of law” and that there was a “miscarriage of justice.”

Donald did not think it was fair for the Crown to introduce the possibility Pickton acted with someone else so late in the trial.

“I view the Crown’s behaviour as scrambling to recover ground,” he wrote.

The confusion could have led to the jury’s verdict of second-degree murder, instead of first-degree, Donald wrote.

“Despite the body of evidence against Pickton, the jury deliberated over nine days and reached the somewhat curious result of second-degree murder.”

The Appeal Court also released a ruling on a separate appeal by the Crown.

The three justices unanimously agreed with the Crown that Williams made several errors in law, included severing the 26 counts into two trials; not allowing a key witness to testify; and prohibiting certain similar fact evidence from being admitted. Most details about this evidence are protected by a publication ban.

Still, they said, “there would be no useful purpose” to remedy these errors by ordering a new trial on 26 counts of first-degree murder if Pickton’s six convictions are upheld and he continues to serve his life sentence.

Pickton was initially charged in February 2002 with two counts of first- degree murder after police raided his Port Coquitlam farm. He was eventually charged with 27 counts.

The trial judge stayed one count involving a Jane Doe, a woman whose identity was never identified.

Pickton’s first murder trial began on Jan. 22, 2007.

nhall@vancouversun.com

© 2009 Kelowna.com. All Rights Reserved.

Family, friends of missing women await Pickton appeal decision on Thursday

By Lori Culbert, Vancouver Sun
June 24, 2009 5:32 PM

VANCOUVER -- It was nearly 12 years ago that Sandra Gagnon last heard from her sister Janet Henry, whose face is one of 64 on a police poster of women missing from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

So it is with a heavy heart that Gagnon will attend the B.C. Court of Appeal in Vancouver on Thursday to learn the fate of Robert (Willie) Pickton, who was convicted of killing six of the missing women and is charged in the deaths of another 20.

Henry is among the 38 women whose whereabouts remain unknown, but many of whose relatives and friends have carefully followed the Pickton proceedings.

“It’s really tough because it’s Janet’s anniversary,” Gagnon said. “I feel a bit of anxiety because you never know how [the appeal court decision] is going to go.

“And we still haven’t found Janet. My family and I are still in limbo. We don’t have any answers about where she is.”

Three B.C. Court of Appeal justices are set to rule at 10:30 a.m. Thursday on appeals by the Crown and the defence, which were heard during a nine-day hearing in late March and early April this year.

Defence lawyer Gil McKinnon argued Pickton’s six second-degree murder convictions should be overturned because a B.C. Supreme Court judge made an error during his charge to the jury and while answering a question by the jury during the 2007 trial.

The Crown’s position was that if Pickton’s six convictions are upheld, prosecutors will not proceed with a second trial on the remaining 20 counts. Pickton, 60, would then continue to serve his life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.

But if the appeal court rules in Pickton’s favour and orders a new trial, the Crown wants to proceed on all 26 counts of first-degree murder.

Regardless of how the appeal court rules, the Crown or defence is expected to seek leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada, which would drag these legal proceedings out even longer.

“You know when you hold your breath, and hold your breath, and hold it so long it hurts? That’s what it feels like,” a frustrated Maggy Gisle said Wednesday.

Gisle followed the trial closely because she was friends with four of the six women Pickton was convicted of killing, in particular Georgina Papin, who died in 1999. But she was also good pals with Cara Ellis, one of the other 20 women Pickton is accused of murdering, and whose case will never be tried if there is no second trial.

So for Gisle, there is no clear victory that could come out of the appeal court today.

“I’d like to see the remaining 20 go to trial because if not, the victims and the family members are denied a due process, which is everybody’s right,” she said.

While it may seem counter-intuitive, Judy Trimble, Cara Ellis’s mother, is hoping Pickton wins his appeal because she wants him to be tried for her daughter’s murder.

“I'm just keeping my fingers crossed and keeping my hopes up that he’s going to win his appeal, then there will be another trial and he will be tried for all 26,” Trimble said.

Vancouver criminal lawyer Mark Jette, who is not involved in Pickton’s appeal, said the defence’s appeal bid will be successful only if the appeal court is convinced Pickton’s trial judge did make errors in law, and that those errors were significant enough to have changed the verdict.

Jette used as an analogy the case of Kelly Ellard, who was convicted of killing Reena Virk in her third trial in B.C. Supreme Court. The BC Court of Appeal overturned that verdict, ruling errors in law had been made. But the Supreme Court of Canada restored the guilty verdict earlier this month, concluding the errors were not serious enough to have altered the verdict.

If the three judges split, the losing side has the automatic right to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. If the ruling is unanimous, the losing side has to seek leave to appeal.

lculbert@vancouversun.com

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Family+friends+missing+women+await+Pickton+appeal+decision+Thursday/1729221/story.html

Pickton appeal judgment due next week

By NEAL HALL , Vancouver Sun
June 17, 2009 4:55 PM

VANCOUVER – A decision in the appeal of serial killer Robert (Willie) Pickton is set for June 25.

Families of Pickton’s murder victims have received advance notice of the pending decision by the B.C. Court of Appeal.

The appeal court will render two judgments — one deciding Pickton’s appeal and the other deciding a cross-appeal by the Crown.

Regardless of how the appeal court rules, the Crown or defence is expected to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.

A split 2-1 decision by the three-judge appeal panel would allow an automatic right of appeal to the nation’s top court.

Pickton, 60, was originally charged with the first-degree murder of 27 women who disappeared from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.

One charge involving an unknown victim listed as “Jane Doe” was stayed by the trial judge, B.C. Supreme Court Justice James Williams, who then decided the remaining 26 counts should be divided into two trials — one involving six charges and the other involving 20 murder counts.

The Crown elected to proceed on six counts at the first trial, which ended on Dec. 9, 2007 with a jury convicting Pickton of the second-degree murder of Sereena Abotsway, Mona Wilson, Andrea Joesbury, Brenda Wolfe, Georgina Papin and Marnie Frey.

The killer, who lived on a farm in Port Coquitlam with his brother, was sentenced to life imprisonment with no chance of parole for 25 years.

The Crown’s position on appeal was that if Pickton’s convictions are upheld, the Crown would not proceed with a second trial. But if the appeal court orders a new trial, the Crown wants to proceed on all 26 murder counts.

Pickton’s current lawyer, Gil McKinnon, argued at the appeal hearing that the trial judge made an error during his charge to the jury and how he dealt with a juror’s question.

Witnesses at Pickton’s trial testified about how he often butchered pigs on the sprawling farm, which was surrounded by residential development.

The Pickton case was the largest serial killer investigation in Canadian history. Two years ago, officials estimated the police investigation cost about $70 million, with the trial costs estimated at another $46 million.

The Crown is expected to release a final tally of the costs after all appeals are exhausted.

nhall@vancouversun.com

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Pickton's ploy

The notion that pig-farm serial killer could get off is preposterous

By ADAM CLAYTON
WINNIPEG SUN

Last Updated: 5th April 2009, 4:51am

Seems old Slick Willie is trying to pull another fast one on the justice system.
That would be serial killer Robert William (Willie) Pickton, who is responsible for some of the most horrific crimes in Canadian history.

Pickton was charged with 26 counts of first-degree murder after police found human heads and other grisly remains on his family's farm in Port Coquitlam, B.C., in 2002.

At his 2007 trial for a half-dozen of the killings, defence lawyers said Pickton was innocent but a jury eventually decided he was guilty on six counts of second-degree murder.

Last week, defence lawyers told the B.C. Court of Appeal the convictions should be overturned because jurors were confused about whether they could consider if Pickton had acted alone in killing drug-addicted sex trade workers from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

Pickton certainly has a right to appeal his convictions, and lawyers cannot be faulted for doing their jobs. But the notion he isn't guilty of multiple murder stinks worse than a hog barn in a heatwave.

It's at least possible other people were involved in the deaths of Pickton's victims. At the appeal hearing last week the Crown admitted as much, saying the convictions should stand as long as the pig farmer took part in the murders, regardless of whether it was Pickton, Dinah Taylor -- who was arrested but not charged in the missing women case -- or someone else who did the actual killing.

But the idea Pickton isn't guilty of murder is preposterous.

This is the ghoul who told an undercover officer he killed 49 women and had planned to "make it an even 50".

Nothing prevented Pickton from taking the stand at trial to explain his statements, or the disturbing evidence found in his trailer.

If he was an innocent dupe as his lawyers would have us believe, you would think he would be eager to discuss everything he knows about the grotesque goings-on on his family's property.

Tight-lipped

If Pickton was but one of a number of people involved in the killings, you would think he would have tried to cut a deal with the Crown.

Instead he has remained tight-lipped. Even after his trial,no one except Pickton knows exactly what happened to his unfortunate victims.

He still faces 20 more counts of first-degree murder and the Crown has said he will be tried on 26 counts if the defence successfully appeals his convictions.

It's high time this grubby little pig farmer came clean about everything that happened on his property. The families of his victims deserve answers.

It's not like Pickton would be the first mass killer to do so.

In 2003 serial killer Gary Ridgway, a.k.a. the Green River Killer, pleaded guilty to 48 murders in neighbouring Washington state. In 2005 Dennis Rader, known as the BTK strangler, co-operated with authorities and confessed to killing 10 people in Wichita, Kan.

And just last week, a Quebec hitman already serving a life sentence for a 2001 murder pleaded guilty to 27 additional charges of first-degree murder.

During his trial, Pickton's lawyers portrayed him as a dim-witted pig farmer. Even if that's true, let's hope he can at least learn by example.

adam.clayton@sunmedia.ca

Copyright © 2009 Winnipeg Sun All Rights Reserved

Serial killer Willie Pickton's murder convictions should be overturned, lawyer argues

By Lori Culbert, Vancouver Sun
March 30, 2009 6:51 PM

VANCOUVER - Serial killer Robert (Willie) Pickton’s trial “went off the rails” during the jury’s deliberations, and therefore his conviction on six counts of second-degree murder should be overturned, a defence lawyer told the B.C. Court of Appeal on Monday.

It is the constitutional right of any defendant, “no matter how heinous the accusations” against him, to have a fair trial, Pickton’s lawyer, Gil McKinnon, argued during the opening day of the appeal of the high-profile 2007 trial.

Therefore, the former Port Coquitlam pig farmer, who is serving a life sentence for killing six women who disappeared from the Downtown Eastside, should be granted a new trial, McKinnon said.

That request elicited a heavy sigh from one of a dozen relatives who were in the courtroom, where six prosecutors and two defence lawyers will make arguments before three appeal court justices over nine days.

More family members and friends of the six victims, as well as of other women who have vanished from the neighbourhood, chanted, beat drums and called out for justice on the courthouse steps in downtown Vancouver.

Three sisters of Georgina Papin, who disappeared 10 years ago and is one of the women Pickton was convicted of killing, travelled from Edmonton to listen to the appeal.

“Every part of this trial is important, especially for our sister Georgina, and we want to make sure she is represented,” said Cynthia Cardinal. “We’ll live with this for the rest of our lives.”

At the centre of the defence’s appeal is the only question the jury members asked the judge during their nine days of deliberations in December 2007. Although the question was awkwardly worded, the jury appeared to be asking whether they could find Pickton guilty if they determined he had “indirectly” killed one or more of the women.

It is a reasonable interpretation, McKinnon said, to conclude that some members of the jury must have thought someone other than Pickton shot the three victims who died of gunshot wounds and, potentially, killed the other three victims, whose cause of death could not be determined because very little of their remains were found on Pickton’s property.

“One or more members of the jury were having some difficulty with the Crown’s theory that Mr. Pickton was the shooter of the three women and/or the killer of the other three women,” the lawyer told the court.

McKinnon argued that the trial judge, Justice James Williams, made five errors, among them: the way he initially addressed the jurors’ question; changing his mind and creating the “real possibility” that some jurors could conclude Pickton could be convicted for acting as a participant, instead of a sole perpetrator, in the deaths; and giving a charge to the jury that was “incomplete, misleading and wholly inadequate.”

McKinnon alleged the Crown’s theory that Pickton acted alone in the murders never wavered in this case until the jury members asked their question, and then the Crown “backslid” from its previous position to embrace the idea he may have worked with someone else. That, the defence argued, “destroyed the integrity of this trial.”

McKinnon indicated that the Crown, which is expected to start its response to the defence appeal today or Wednesday, will argue it did not change its position.

On Dec. 9, 2007, three days after asking its question, the jury found Pickton not guilty of first-degree murder, but guilty of the lesser charge of second-degree murder in the deaths of Papin, Sereena Abotsway, Mona Wilson, Andrea Joesbury, Brenda Wolfe and Marnie Frey.

The Crown has also filed its own appeal, arguing the trial judge made six errors, including rulings on whether the jury heard certain evidence and severing the charges against Pickton into two trials, one of six counts and the other of 20. The Crown’s appeal will likely be presented next week, once argument in the defence appeal is finished.

Pickton, who is serving a life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years, was not present in court.

The 50-seat courtroom was packed most of Monday morning with reporters, victims’ supporters, members of the public, and two Missing Women Task Force investigators. The crowd thinned out in the afternoon, as the legal arguments became more technical.

Community activists Bernie Williams and Gladys Radek, who last year walked across Canada to demand a public inquiry in the case, wore distinctive red native robes in the courtroom. Many of the women who disappeared from the Downtown Eastside were aboriginal.

Also in the courtroom were relatives of some of the other 20 women who Pickton is accused of killing. They hope Pickton will face a second trial on those counts, but the Crown has said it will not proceed with that trial if the defence’s appeal bid is unsuccessful.

lculbert@vancouversun.com

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Inquiry urged for B.C.'s missing women

BY LORI CULBERT | VANCOUVER SUN
March 11, 2009

VANCOUVER - A group of native leaders, community activists and victims’ families gathered in Oppenheimer Park this morning to collectively call for a public inquiry into missing and murdered women in British Columbia.

The inquiry should look into the case of the 65 women missing from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, six of whom serial killer Robert (Willie) Pickton has been convicted of killing.

It should also examine the case of 18 murdered or missing women in the so-called Highway of Tears case in rural B.C., Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs, said in an interview.

Phillip and the B.C. Civil Liberties Association sent letters outlining their request Wednesday to Premier Gordon Campbell, Attorney-General Wally Oppal, and Solicitor General John van Dongan. Victims’ families attended the rally today, and have long believed that society paid little attention to their loved ones vanishing from the Downtown Eastside because they were poor, marginalized women, many of them Aboriginal.

“This situation was allowed to continue a very, very long time. It spanned a couple of decades. Had there been an immediate response on behalf of the Vancouver police, the RCMP and the criminal justice branch, we suggest lives could have been saved,” Phillip said.

Phillip argued the same systemic issues exist in the Highway of Tears case, which has not resulted in any suspects being arrested yet.

Oppal repeated Wednesday what he has said in the past: It is unlikely any inquiry would be held until the Pickton case is no longer before the courts. "I'm really sympathetic to [the victims’ families]. We all want to find out what happened. But the missing women's case is really a part of the Pickton case, and that matter is still before the court of appeal,” Oppal said in Victoria. "We can't order any inquiry, it would be totally improper for us until the courts have finally and completely disposed of the charges."

Pickton was convicted in 2007 of six counts of second-degree murder.

An appeal of the verdict is scheduled for two weeks, starting March 30.

However, Phillip and others fear the case could drag through the courts for years while Pickton exhausts the appeal process.

Pickton has also been charged with killing 20 other missing women, but it is also not clear whether that trial will ever be held.

Waiting several more years for an inquiry would be wrong, “given the frailty of human memories, the loss or destruction of relevant evidence with time, and the retirement or death of key witnesses,” says the letter sent to the politicians.

If the government does not grant an inquiry soon, Phillip said, those in attendance at today’s rally threatened to stage demonstrations during the 2010 Olympics to “draw this to the attention of the international community.”

“The families are sick and tired of being stonewalled,” he added.

David Eby, of the civil liberties association, also called on the government to cover expenses for victims’ families to attend Pickton’s appeal, as it did for the families during his 2007 trial.

And Eby said the group would like assurances that Pickton’s second trial on 20 counts of first-degree murder will proceed.

The government has indicated it may not, should the defence fail in its appeal bid, as Pickton is already serving a life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.

lculbert@vancouversun.com

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun