Jury hears closing arguments in 25 year old murder case
Closing arguments made in murder case dating back 26 years
- The murder was 26 years ago, but Crown prosecutor Brian Wilford urged the jurors to convict the now frail, elderly man sitting across from them for Beverley Ann Dyke's death.
- Lawyers gave closing arguments yesterday in the first degree murder trial against 68 year old, Robert Kociuk.
- Robert Kociuk, 68, stands accused of killing 48-year-old Beverley Dyke, whose body was discovered May 17, 1984, in a wooded area near what is now Murray Industrial Park, just southwest of the airport.
- She was stabbed 13 times and sexually assaulted, her body left half naked in the wooded bush.
- Part of the jury's decision will depend on whether they believe another dead man is responsible for the 1984 stabbing death of Dyke. Defence lawyers argued the jury cannot find Kociuk guilty due to a confession made by Leonard White, who died in 1999. While in jail at the Saskatchewan Penitentiary in 1988, White confessed to stabbing the divorced 48-year-old woman, who police believe disappeared while she was out walking near her Wolseley-area home.
- He made a full confession but police said that since he had falsely confessed to many murders just before his parole eligibility came up and was considered an habitual liar, they did not believe his claim.
- White had grappled with psychological issues and self-mutilation, and stabbed another Wolseley woman in the throat, which was the reason he was in prison after being convicted of aggravated assault.
- He attempted suicide around the same time Dyke's body was found. Defence lawyers say he did so, because he felt guilty over what he had done.
- "Leonard White killed her," said lawyer Roberta Campbell, who represents Kociuk. "He was a violent, dangerous, explosive psychopath."
- Police said White's confessions contained no information that wasn't contained in news reports and they thought the confession was bogus. White was interviewed by police again 10 years later. "He knew nothing and said nothing only the killer would know," Wilford said.
- But Defence lawyers say that he did know certain details of the murder that only the killer would know, such as the fact that she was found partially clothed from the waist down, held up her hands to defend herself and he could describe the exact location where her body was found.
- The trial has been hearing testimony for the past 2 weeks. The Judge will give his Charge to the Jury this morning, with deliberations to follow, starting in the afternoon.
- Police arrested Kociuk in 2005 and charged him with murder after he was forced to submit a DNA sample following robbery convictions in Hamilton, Ont.
- Kociuk was arrested for a bank robbery the day Dyke’s body was discovered. He was serving time at Millhaven Penitentiary in Ontario for a different robbery when he was charged with Dyke’s murder in 2005 after Winnipeg police matched a semen sample taken from Dyke’s body with Kociuk’s DNA.
- The tests showed his semen matched a sample taken from Dyke's body, which was found in a wooded area near the Winnipeg airport. Kociuk told Winnipeg police repeatedly he did not know Dyke, including in an interview only days after the killing. During the trial, his lawyers conceded Kociuk had sex with Dyke.
- Although they are unsure as to when he had sex with her and whether it was consensual or not, therefore, raising a doubt as to whether she was sexually assaulted and ultimately murdered by Kociuk.
- Kociuk was seen searching near where a bloody knife was later found, the day before Dyke's body was found, but he told investigators he was looking for trash and waiting to make a deal for a gun to be used in a bank robbery.
- The bank robbery took place the next day.
- "Mr. Kociuk is a bank robber, not a murderer,” said defence lawyer Roberta Campbell, referring to her client’s criminal past.
- Defence lawyer Roberta Campbell asked jurors to acquit Kociuk, arguing another ex-con named Leonard White — who confessed to the crime in 1988 while serving an assault sentence in Saskatchewan — was the real killer.
- White, who died in 1999, slashed his wrists in a failed suicide attempt hours before Dyke’s body was found in 1984. Campbell argued he knew details of the crime only the killer would know when he confessed to it four years later.
- Police rejected White’s confession at the time because they didn’t believe it was credible.
- “Mr. Kociuk had sex with (Dyke) at one time, Leonard White killed her,” Campbell said. “He killed her and the police are wrong. The police make mistakes now and they made them in the ’80s.”
- Crown prosecutor Brian Wilford told jurors White was a habitual liar who fabricated the confession because he wanted to remain in prison with his cellmate Ken Kirton, who was also his lover.
- The Crown and defence presented different views to jurors Wednesday on other issues as well, including the time and date of Dyke’s death, whether a knife found several hundred yards from the scene was the murder weapon, and why Kociuk gave police different reasons for having been seen near the scene within days — or possibly even hours — of Dyke’s death.
- Kociuk, now a grey-haired senior who walks with a cane, sat silently in the prisoner’s box all day, rarely changing his stoic expression as he listened to the arguments. He did not testify during the trial.
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