Robert Pickton

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Robert William "Willie" Pickton (born October 24, 1949 ) is a convicted Canadian serial killer and former farmer who ran a pig in Port Coquitlam near Vancouver . Pickton was arrested in February 2002. In September 2007 he was found guilty of manslaughter ( second degree murder ) of six women. A second charge of 20 more alleged homicides has been dropped. Robert Pickton may have been responsible for more than 50 homicides.

history

Robert Pickton is suspected on his 6  hectares large farm killed more than 49 women, with a chopper crushed and his pig to have fed. With this number of murders, Pickton would be the serial killer with the most casualties in Canada. It is also believed that his brother David "Dave" Pickton and the responsible pig supplier Pat Casanova were involved in the murders.

Pickton was arrested on February 22, 2002. The first trial began on January 30, 2006. The public prosecutor's office charged the pig farmer with murdering 26 drug-addicted prostitutes between 1995 and 2001 . The women came from the notorious Downtown Eastside , a district of Vancouver that is marked by poverty, violence, prostitution and drug trafficking. Due to the high number of prostitutes who had disappeared (68 in total), a police task force was set up to clarify these cases. Initially, Pickton was only suspect in two cases. However, during the investigation, DNA from at least 33 missing women was found on his property. These traces could, however, come in part from the occasional parties held there, in which prostitutes also took part.

It was suspected that the pig fattening that Pickton ran with his brother David Pickton also brought into circulation self-made sausage products, presumably either directly mixed with human meat or from pigs to which human meat was fed. Pickton's yard was demolished. In a barn on the farm, bikers had regularly held parties ( Piggy Palace Good Times Society ). Dave, Pickton's younger brother, was a biker. Pickton showed little reaction in court and protested his innocence in all cases, the real perpetrators were at large.

Trial and conviction

The legal proceedings that followed after the forensic evidence was obtained dealt with 26 alleged murder cases. For procedural reasons, it was split into two proceedings. The trial, which deals with the first 6 suspected murders, began on January 22, 2007. The second trial, which deals with the remaining 20 suspected killings, was eventually dropped. 9 December 2007 Robert Pickton was the first process by a jury of manslaughter ( second degree murder convicted) in six cases and sentenced on 12 December 2007 to life imprisonment. Pickton has to serve at least 25 years in prison after the verdict.

In 2009, both the defense and the Crown Attorney appealed the verdict. Both appeals were dismissed. On August 4, 2010, the Vancouver Prosecutor's Office announced that there would be no further trial for the 20 other people allegedly killed, as Pickton's sentence would not be increased even if he was found guilty. The reactions from relatives were mixed. Some were outraged that Pickton would not be held responsible, others were relieved that there would not be a long process with disturbing details.

The true number of Pickton's victims is unknown. Pickton is said to have told a supposed fellow prisoner, who was, however, used as an undercover police officer, of 49 victims.

The entire process, including the search for clues, during which the entire property was dug up, and the genetic engineering DNA analysis have cost the Canadian authorities 70 million Canadian dollars so far .

The German citizen Alexandra Reisch-Zimmerling worked as a housekeeper on Pickton's farm for three months in the autumn of 1979 - a good twenty years before the murders took place. According to her statements, the then 21-year-old German was neither threatened nor harassed by Pickton. After a later short visit in 1994, during which she did not meet Pickton, she only noticed that part of the farm was now cordoned off.

Criticism of the police

During and after the trial, various quarters criticized the work of the Vancouver Police Department. This would not have correctly classified the disappearance of the women for far too long and suspected that a serial killer might be at work, with the argument that the disappeared women had probably moved. Relatives' concerns were not taken seriously. It also played a role that the disappeared were prostitutes, some drug addicts and often relatives of the Canadian natives. These are fringe groups, whose fate is often ignored by society. If women had disappeared from a “bourgeois” milieu, there would have been a completely different and much earlier reaction. On July 30, 2010, at a press conference on July 30, 2010, the Vice Chief of Police of Vancouver apologized publicly to the relatives of the disappeared for the omissions of the police.

Names of missing women

The six victims of Picktons from the December 9, 2007 verdict were: Sereena Abotsway, Mona Wilson, Andrea Joesbury, Brenda Wolfe, Marnie Frey, Georgina Papin.

The names of the other women: Jacqueline McDonell, Diane Rock, Heather Bottomley, Patricia Johnson, Helen Hallmark, Jennifer Furminger, Heather Chinnock, Tanya Holyk, Sherry Irving, Inga Hall, Cara Ellis, Andrea Borhaven, Debra Lynne Jones, Tiffany Drew, Kerry Koski, Sarah Devries, Cynthia Feliks, Angela Jardine, Wendy Crawford, Diana Melnick.

reception

In the crime series Criminal Minds , the case is picked up in season 4 in the double episode At the End of the Day .

Web links

Commons : Robert Pickton  - collection of images, videos and audio files
 Wikinews: Suspected serial killer convicted in Canada  - news

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Pickton trial timeline. In: CBC , August 9, 2010 (English)
  2. ↑ First 50, then a break, then again 25. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , February 7, 2007
  3. ↑ Katja Gelinsky: Serial Murder in the Pig Palace . In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , December 12, 2006
  4. ↑ Markus Gärtner: Probably the worst serial killer. In: Welt Online , February 16, 2007
  5. ↑ 'Human meat' alert at pig farm. BBC News, March 11, 2004, accessed June 3, 2017 .
  6. ^ Pickton gets life, no chance of parole for 25 years. CTVNews, December 11, 2007, accessed June 3, 2017 .
  7. ^ Rod Mickleburgh: Pickton legal saga ends as remaining charges stayed. The Globe and Mail, August 4, 2010, accessed June 3, 2017 .
  8. ↑ Woman murderer appeals. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , January 10, 2008.
  9. ↑ Karlheinz Kas: "I got to know him very differently" In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , January 26, 2007
  10. ↑ Joanna Joll: Why I failed to catch Canada's worst serial killer. June 1, 2017, accessed June 3, 2017 .
  11. ↑ Chad Skelton: Vancouver police apologize for not catching. July 30, 2010, accessed June 3, 2017 .
  12. ↑ Robert Pickton in the Criminal Minds Wiki (English)
personal data
SURNAME Pickton, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pickton, Robert William; Pickton, Willie
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Canadian serial killer
DATE OF BIRTH October 24, 1949