Robert Pickton's conviction on six second-degree murder counts and his upcoming trial on 20 first-degree counts puts the Port Coquitlam, B.C., pig farmer into an exclusive, notorious group of Canadian multiple murderers. Others include:
Marc Lepine: Gunned down-- young women at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique with semi-automatic rifle on Dec. 6,'89, apparently out of blind hatred for women. So-called "Montreal Massacre" led to tighter gun controls.
Clifford Robert Olson: Serving life in prison for the murders of 11 children and youths in the Vancouver area, confessed in'81 and was paid $100,000 in the infamous cash-for-bodies deal that disclosed whereabouts of the remains.
Mark Chahal: Estranged husband of Rajwar Gakhal burst into the Gakhal family home in Vernon, B.C., on Good Friday'96 as they were busy preparing for a wedding and shot his wife and eight family members before killing himself.
Michael Wayne McGray: Serving life for first-degree murder for killing Joan Hicks of Moncton, N.B., in what he said was a cocaine rage; also confessed to killing Mark Gibbons of St. John, N.B., and two Montreal men. Claims to have killed 16 people in all.
Allan Legere: So-called "Monster of the Miramichi" caused a reign of terror after escaping custody in'89 for the murder of shopkeeper John Glendenning and during seven months of freedom killed three women and a priest. His conviction featured the first Canadian use of DNA matching.
Russell Maurice Johnson: Dubbed the Bedroom Strangler, Johnson terrorized the communities of London and Guelph, Ont., in the'70s, and was committed to a maximum-security mental institution after pleading not guilty by reason of insanity in the murders of three women. He later confessed to raping and killing four others but was never charged.
Wayne Clifford Boden: Found guilty in'72 of the rape-murders of three women in Montreal and one in Calgary, convicted in part because bite marks left on the women's breasts matched a cast taken of his teeth; sparked an uproar when he escaped briefly in'77 while on a day pass and was found with a valid American Express credit card. He died of cancer in 2006.
Paul Bernardo: Labelled a dangerous offender, convicted in'95 of the rape-murders of Leslie Mahaffy of Burlington, Ont., and Kristin French of St. Catharines, Ont., and of killing Tammy Homolka, his wife Karla's teenage sister, in a conspiracy with Karla to sexually assault the drugged girl. Homolka served 12 years for manslaughter in all the killings in return for testifying against Bernardo and now is free, living under a new name.
--The Canadian Press
PREVIOUS
