A Winnipeg "cold case" mystery has finally landed in court -- more than 23 years after a jogger stumbled upon the body of Beverley Ann Dyke lying in a wooded area near the airport.
Her alleged killer -- 66-year-old Robert Joseph Kociuk -- began his preliminary hearing this week by pleading not guilty to a charge of first-degree murder.
A court-ordered ban prevents specific details of the case from being published. It is slated to last until November and will determine if there is sufficient evidence to proceed to trial.
Kociuk is accused of stabbing the 48-year-old divorced mother of three seven times in her chest and abdomen during the course of a sexual assault.
The May 1984 killing would remain unsolved until frustrated Winnipeg police finally got an unexpected break in 2004.
Kociuk had just appeared in a Hamilton, Ont., courtroom and was convicted of two counts of robbing a local cheque-cashing business. He was also ordered to submit a DNA sample as part of his sentence.
Police eventually compared Kociuk's sample to semen taken from the victim 21 years earlier.
There was a match.
Kociuk, who was an inmate at Millhaven Institution in Ontario, was arrested on the murder charge in November 2005 and brought back to Manitoba where he has remained at Stony Mountain penitentiary.
Kociuk must be presumed innocent of Dyke's murder until proven otherwise. He has numerous convictions for robbery dating back to 1964 and has spent much of his life behind bars. He was out on parole at the time of Dyke's slaying.
Dyke's adult son, along with his wife, have never spoken publicly about the arrest but did release a statement through police.
"This is a difficult time of mixed emotion for the family. Because of the Winnipeg police and the national DNA registry, an arrest has been made 21 years after their mother was murdered. While they are very pleased, it also opens old wounds. They pray for justice," police said.
Dyke, a resident of the Wolseley area, was a genuinely kind person who trusted people, according to police. It's believed she was likely out walking when she met someone and got into their car without a struggle.
Two other high-profile cold cases remain before the courts.
* Mark Edward Grant, a convicted sex offender, was arrested last May and charged with first-degree murder for the 1984 kidnapping and slaying of 13-year-old Candace Derksen.
The teen was grabbed as she returned home from school in East Kildonan, triggering a massive search that ended weeks later with the discovery of her bound, frozen body inside an industrial shed.
Grant was considered a suspect at the time but the police didn't get a break until improvements in DNA testing allowed them to re-open the file last year and submit new samples for testing.
Grant remains before the courts and no dates have been set for hearing.
* Orville William Wolanicki, Ernest Dennis Wolanicki and Hugh Edward Young were arrested in November 2001 and charged with second-degree murder for the 1987 beating death of Erwin Kakoschke.
The 63-year-old victim was found dead in the front yard of his home in North Kildonan. Police used improved DNA technology to break open the case, but it has since languished in the justice system while lawyers fight over several technical issues and motions include wiretaps.
The case has never gone to a preliminary hearing because the Crown proceeded by direct indictment All three accused are out on bail and now set to stand trial next September.
www.mikeoncrime.com
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