Police saw 911 killer stroll from scene

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 01/02/2002 (8890 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Minutes after stabbing Corrine McKeown and Doreen Leclair, William Dunlop strolled out the back door, exchanged a few words with a police officer and disappeared down the back lane, an inquest into the women’s deaths was told yesterday.

“I called out to the male in hopes of getting some information,” said Const. Steve Peltier, one of the first officers on the scene.

“I yelled across to the male, ‘Hank, are you Hank?’ The male yelled back ‘No, maybe inside. There’s a bunch of them inside.'”

Peltier then asked if Dunlop could subdue the dogs, which were barking wildly in the house.

“He made no further response,” Peltier said. “He was exiting the gate as I was yelling at him.”

It’s the first time the public has heard that police had contact with Dunlop at the scene of the crime, which occurred Feb. 16, 2000. Dunlop, who was McKeown’s sometimes boyfriend, was arrested about 24 hours later, after a standoff at a Notre Dame Avenue apartment building where he was hiding. He is serving a life sentence.

“As far as I knew there was no suspect for anything,” said Peltier, an 11-year police veteran at the time.

“I was hoping to get in the house and see what we were dealing with. At the time I didn’t think anything untoward was going on.”

Later on, Peltier went looking for Dunlop on foot, thinking he might be a material witness. A second police car also searched the neighbourhood. A few hours later, yellow police tape traced a path north of Leclair’s Manitoba Avenue home where the canine unit had tried to follow his trail.

McKeown and Leclair lay dead inside the Manitoba Avenue home while Peltier and Dunlop spoke at about 5:05 a.m., but Peltier and his partner, Const. Troy Hyde, wouldn’t know that for another 15 minutes.

The only information Peltier had at the time was that a 911 call had been made, a woman’s voice had been heard and the operator spoke to a man who identified himself as Hank Wacko.

That was information from the sisters’ fifth call to police that night, their final plea for help. Only “uh” was heard from Leclair, who was stabbed as she made the call, and then Dunlop tried to persuade the operator that everything was all right. A car was dispatched immediately.

Peltier and Hyde, who arrived within three minutes, banged on the locked front door and loudly identified themselves. Inside, Leclair’s two dogs were barking and all the blinds were drawn, so the officers couldn’t see in. Hyde initially thought there were 10 dogs.

Peltier said he then walked to the side of the house, stopping at the backyard fence because he thought there were more dogs in the backyard. He was also trying to keep Hyde in sight. Dunlop was about 15 metres away when he saw him.

At about 5:10 a.m., one of the dogs poked his nose through the curtains, leaving a small gap that the officers peered through. They saw a woman lying on the floor with what Hyde described as a reddish stain near her, but he said they couldn’t tell whether she’d had a heart attack, been stabbed or was having a diabetic reaction. They called for an ambulance.

The canine unit arrived and the handler, Peltier and Hyde went in the unlocked back door. The handler and his dog herded Leclair’s large dogs into the backyard and the police officers found the women.

Through questioning by police association lawyer Hymie Weinstein, Peltier said there was no sign of a struggle inside the home and neither the front nor back doors were forced open.

Stefanie Anderson, who spoke to the women during the third call but decided not to send a police car because Dunlop wasn’t there, told them to lock the doors and call police if he returned. Outside the inquest, Weinstein said clearly that advice wasn’t heeded.

Sue Cieslar, who spoke to the sisters on the fourth call and asked that a police car be dispatched, has testified that while Leclair said the couple was fighting, she didn’t believe it was physical. Peltier said there was no overturned furniture or broken beer bottles.

Cieslar’s call sat for more than two hours without being dispatched. Yet the dispatcher working that night, Brenda Foy, was not slated to be a witness until Cieslar testified that Foy confessed to not reading the details of the call.

Peltier told Weinstein that about one-third of all domestic calls should have a lower priority than the Priority 1 all are automatically assigned. He added that a general patrol car will take one or two domestic calls every shift.

He said a straight-forward call where a neighbour hears two people yelling and no charges are laid can tie up 90 minutes of their time. A call where an arrest is made — at the same address where the complaint is taken — will keep them off the streets for more than four and a half hours.

As well, there aren’t enough cars on the street, Peltier said, estimating that in a busy district like the north end — where the women were killed — they run from call to call to call 90 per cent of their shift.

Two weeks have been cleared in April to hear further testimony, provincial court Judge Judith Webster said yesterday. It was hoped the inquest would wrap up Feb. 15. As well, she said she will be deciding whether Police Chief Jack Ewatski will be called as a witness.

kim.guttormson@freepress.mb.ca

PHOTO MARC GALLANT/WINNIPEG FREE PRESS