Welcome to my Crime and Justice blog! I am a 19 year old criminal justice student at the University of Winnipeg. I advocate for prisoners' rights, human rights, equality and criminal justice/prison system reforms.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Defence alleges that Robert Kociuk is not the real killer


- Defence lawyers in a Winnipeg rape-and-murder trial allege the real killer is a criminal who did in 1999.
- Robert Kociuk, 68, is on trial, accused of raping and stabbing Beverley Dyke, 48, to death in 1984 and leaving her half-naked body in a wooded area near Winnipeg's Richardson International Airport.
- Defence lawyers say that Leonard White, who died in 1999, was the real killer of Dyke. 
- His former cellmate and lover, Ken Kirton, told court that White would brag about killing people all the time. 
- “He would boast: ‘I killed before and I can kill again.’ When he was getting punked off or didn’t feel like a man, ... he would say he killed just to make himself look good.” White and Kirton were cellmates at Saskatchewan Penitentiary when, in 1988, White told Winnipeg police he had killed Dyke.
- Last week, retired detectives David Shipman and Ron Morin told jurors they did not believe White’s story. Shipman said White had a history of falsely confessing to crimes whenever he was up for parole and he also told of his alleged accomplice, Ricky Morris, who it turned out, did not exist anywhere according to police records, which supports the theory that White was lying.
- Kirton said Monday he and White were cellmates and sex partners for three or four years.
- Whenever White was approaching parole eligibility, he would confess to a murder, to ensure that he would stay in prison and not leave his lover.
- White's two statements to police -- taken in 1988 and 1998 -- are the focal points of a first-degree murder trial against the man accused of the slaying.
- Retired Winnipeg police detective Robert McQuat testified Monday how he was sent to interview White in 1998 as police continued to probe Dyke's unsolved slaying. McQuat was aware White had claimed responsibility for the attack in 1988 but was never charged based on the belief he was lying.
- White offered to give a blood and saliva sample for DNA comparison but refused to discuss Dyke's killing in any detail. White grew agitated when police suggested they read his previous statement to him.
- Jurors also heard Monday from White's former parole officer, who said the inmate seemed content to stay in jail, because he didn't want to be separated from his lover with whom he shared a cell with in the Saskatchewan prison.

This is a very interesting case. It's hard to tell right now, whether I believe Leonard White or not.  

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