The jury might have wanted to give Rosen the concession he had asked for—say second degree on Mahaffy—something for his commendable efforts, but there was no room for sentimentality. Anyone who saw those videotapes lost whatever capacity they might otherwise have had for pathos.
Even though the nine charges of which Bernardo was found guilty all carried hfe sentences, in Canada an accused person can only be sentenced to one lifetime in jail. There is no death penalty. Paul Bernardo got life with no possibility for parole in less than twenty-five years—the maximum sentence allowable.
Later, the Crown insisted Bernardo be declared a “dangerous offender,” an esoteric designation that did not mean what it said, at least not within the bureaucracies of the judicial and penal systems. A man such as Bernardo would never get out of jail; in fact, had he not been declared a “dangerous offender,” Hfe in jail would have been much harder on him. This way his status would be reviewed more often, and more people would talk to him.
The Kingston Penitentiary^ for Men built a new holding cell in Paul Bernardo’s honor. He would have to remain in total isolation for the rest of his natural life; because the prisons in Kingston were federal institutions, they ran Hke government bureaucracies. Prison guards were civil servants. When they were charged with keeping a man separate and alive, they did so. No “skin beefers”—a con’s term for child molesters and rapists such as Paul Bernardo—had been murdered in a federal Canadian penitentiary^ since the riots at Kingston in 1972.
Where Bernardo’s cell faced the corridor, the bars were covered with bulletproof Plexiglas through which small holes had
been punched for air circulation. Reminiscent of the cell inhabited by Dr. Hannibal Lector in The Silence of the Lambs, Bernardo’s cell was a third that size.
Only four feet by eight feet, it was barely large enough for the six-footer to move between his cot, combination stainless steel sink and toilet, writing desk and television stand. There was a twenty-four-hour video surveillance camera that recorded his every waking move and sleepless twitch.
Eventually, a cassette of Bernardo in prison showed up on television, with an accompanying story and picture in a Toronto tabloid. It was a postcard from hell. Even though he was still alive, Paul Bernardo had been “disposed of”
Sister Josephine was doing quite well. Dr. Arndt’s “buzzing” had worked. She was back in the world, trying to fulfil her mission, challenging the daily travail. Sister Josephine remained in a quandary about her spiritual colleague’s remonstrance that there was “no such thing as a disposable human being.”
The more she heard about Karla Homolka and Paul Bernardo, the more she wondered about whether or not the preferable God was the vengeful, wrathful Old Testament God in the Book of Job. After all, what was hell for, except eternal damnation. She remained afflicted with the ambivalence she felt about Karla Homolka.
In Niagara Falls, the undisputed tabloid capital of the World, not everything was turning out the way the residents might have hoped. The Houdini Museum had burned down in 1994. The casino went ahead as planned, but apparently there was some problem with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s $879 million transcendental meditation theme park, Veda Land. One out of two ain’t bad, said the mayor, who had once posed as a beefcake Sunshine Boy for a Toronto tabloid newspaper.
In the Criminals Hall of Fame, which sits atop Clifton Hill overlooking the “frightful Abyss,”—as Father Hennepin had called Niagara Falls when he first laid eyes on them in 1683—
there are no immediate plans to install a Paul and Karla Bernardo exhibit.
The Criminals Hall of Fame is a strange place. It used to be a restaurant, until the owners died and left it to their sons. Restaurants were too much work, so the Lombardi boys turned it into the Criminals Hall of Fame. Like most thmgs in Niagara Falls, it’s tack)’ and a bit of a sham. The bevy of exhibits are not built around real wax figures like those in Madame Toussaud’s. Al Capone, Joe Valachi, the Boston Strangler—^Albert DeSalvo—and the Moors Murderers, Myra Hindley and Ian Brady are all stick figures, hke scarecrows.
Their wax faces appear to have been cast in a single mold, the differences between them articulated only by wigs, facial hair and dress. The curators of the Criminals Hall of Fame do not distinguish between real and fictional crime figures. Right next to Charlie Manson’s exhibit, wherein the word “PIG” is scrawled on the back wall in Day-Glo red, is Freddy Kruger’s stall. But Paul and Karla are so far verboten—the brothers do not want to outrage the community’.
Nonetheless, business has been brisk. The Lombardis have just given The Criminals Hall of Fame a neon-inspired, hundred-thousand-dollar face-hft and today, it may just be the finest facade on the hill in the city of Niagara Falls.
In the meantime, Casey Hill’s ship came in. The senior official in the Crown law office got several millions of dollars from the Church of Scientology. He had sued for slander a decade earher, and the courts had finally found in his favor. Shortly after he started work on the search warrants with Detective Steve Irwin, Hill was appointed to the bench.
Two years later, Marion Boyd, the attorney-general who sanctioned Karla’s deal, was voted out of office. The assistant deputy minister, Michael Code, who had been instrumental in getting Karla her deal, quit. Murray Segal left his wife and three children, and moved in with Michal Fairburn. Some faceless bureaucrat inexphcably fired the Scarborough prosecutor Mary Hall.
All the ground-breaking profilers from the FBI have since retired, including John Douglas, Roy Hazelwood and Gregg
INVISIBLE darkness 525
McCrary. Hazelwood tersely observed that now he could “make some real money” on the lecture circuit.
John Rosen has left the criminal bar. Francis “Doc” Kovacs is retired. The media’s appeal of the publication ban he levied during Karla’s so-called “trial” in July, 1993, is still pending. Ken Murray tried to explain himself in a Toronto tabloid newspaper. He is still under investigation. Iguanas are still eating George Walker’s hibiscus on Montserrat. Mark DeMarco’s Masonic skull still sits in its bulletproof glass case at the center of his store, surrounded by a bevy of tiny, erotic, ivory netsukes.
Inspector Vince Bevan has become Superintendent Vince Bevan and has been kept busy chasing motorcycle gangs. He is very worried about the Hell’s Angels. The Parkway Hotel and Bowling Lanes has become a Ramada Inn. Buddy’s Bar is gone.
Even though Karla’s cell is just a stone’s throw from her ex-husband’s, they live in two different worlds. The compound in which Paul Bernardo resides is half a block south of the Kingston Prison for Women, at the base of Sir John A. Macdonald Parkway on the river bank. A thirty-foot-high limestone wall inhibits the prisoners’ view of the scenic St. Lawrence River and the United States.
Kingston, Ontario, is known for three things—Queen’s University, the prisons and ex—Lovin’ Spoonful Zal Yablonsky’s restaurant, Chez Piggy’s. Paul Bernardo is as gone as the dead girls. Karla has finally learned to accentuate the positive and let “the trouble”—as prison psychologist Jan Heney called it—go.
At six-by-nine feet, Karla’s cell is about the same size as her ex-husband’s, but unlike his specially configured closet Karla’s is just a normal cell—one often in segregation. Karla calls it “her room” and tells everyone that segregation is really just like a university dorm.
Toward the front of the cell is her single bed. At arm’s length directly across from the bed is a dresser, and beside the dresser is Karla’s desk, where she writes and studies.
In her letters to Dr. Arndt, Karla tells him she is reading classics such as Crime and Punishment. She has already successfully completed a series of correspondence courses offered by the university, including the Principles of Psychology, Sociology of Deviance and introductory courses in women’s studies. To anyone who wants to understand her, Karla recommends Lenore Walker’s TIte Battered Woman and the gruesome Perfect
Victim. After her “godsend,” Dr. Hatcher, visited Karla, she took to mailing out highlighted copies of the definitive “Compliant Victims of the Sexual Sadist.”
To one such lucky recipient Karla wrote, “I’ve highUghted the parts that are directly appHcable to me. It’s frightening to know that there are so many of these men out there. But it’s also a relief to know that I’m not the only woman who has ever gone through this… . Please note that the woman referred to in the last highlighted paragraph is not me. It’s so eerily similar that I thought I better make that clear.”
At the end opposite the bars, her toilet and sink are separated by what Karla calls a tallboy. Karla is allowed to put up drapes— called “shams”—on the outside of her bars. She has specific guards assigned to her, such as Rick Waller. It is part of the guards’ routine that they visually observe her every fifteen or twenty minutes.
Karla reclines on her bed and flips absentmindedly through the pages of a fashion magazine. She fingers the crucifix Sister Josephine gave her. She is thinking about her life. After all this, what sort of woman could she become? What will the future bring? She would like to work with battered women. She would like to find a good man and get serious, this time, about starting a family.
She has plastered her walls with Mickey Mouse posters, dog pictures and photographs of her family and friends. The “friends” part of the wall display is getting thinner. Fully aware that the facets of friendship in the Exclusive Diamond Club were really only Zircons, Karla relished the collapse of Debbie Purdie’s marriage. And she is sure Kathy Ford will rot in hell. Karla is glad that she and Paul “ruined” the Fords’ wedding video—like Kathy said when she was testifying at Paul’s trial— just by being in it. Imagine selling out their friendship and Karla’s letters to a tabloid for a few thousand dollars.
Karla is trying to determine what she is going to look Hke when she is paroled next summer. Perhaps she will dye her hair black—Paul always liked black-haired girls—and buy a pair of Gaultier glasses. They are so expensive. What will she do for money? She thinks she will start horseback riding again and take jumping lessons. One thing is for certain, she will never take anything for granted in her life again.
Karla usually gets out every day for a walk in the prison yard. At night she does stomach crunches and spot training, and then every other day she rides the stationary bike. Since she is only out of her cell for an hour each day, she does not want to ride the bike for forty-five minutes hke she used to. But Karla is in good shape. On the weekends she plays badminton in the gym.
Every sixth weekend she is allowed a “little house” visit with her mother and sister. Her father often stays home and looks after Buddy. Karla is even permitted to stay in the “little house” alone sometimes, three-day stints that she cherishes. It is almost like vacationing at a trailer park.
Karla bides her time, sitting in her cell, reading about the Moors Murders, studying women’s issues, painting her nails, planning her new look.
Karla’s sister Lori sent her a letter in which she observed how easily people were conned and how great it was that Karla could apply for unescorted day passes already, and somehow that letter turned up on the front page of a tabloid paper in Toronto. People were outraged and everybody made a big deal out of it.
It did not matter. Karla knew, when all was said and done, the new Karla Homolka would be out next year, and nobody could steal letters from a woman they could not see.
acknowledgments
â– want to thank my companion, Marsha Boulton. Without her strength of character, and her skills as a researcher, reader and writer, this book would never have been written. Neither would the book ever have been finished without her survival skills and humor.
I want to particularly thank my publisher Kim McArthur and everyone at Litde, Brown Canada for their unflagging enthusiasm and support for this book from the beginning. I am also grateful that Allan Samson of Little, Brown U.K. shared his Canadian counterparts’ sentiments as did my American agent, Sterhng Lord, and Ehsa Petrini at Bantam Books, New York. Special thanks go to my Canadian agent, Bruce Westwood,
for his unwavering and fervent support over the last three years.
There are a number of other people I must thank and it is ironic that Justice Francis “Doc” Kovacs is among them. Prior to Karla Homolka’s trial in July, 1993, Justice Kovacs decided that books are not media, and put me out of his St. Catharines courtroom along with the American press and the Canadian public.
His order drew the attention of Ttie New York Times, the Washingtofi Post and the world to a situation that would have otherwise gone relatively unnoticed internationally. I am more in his debt than anyone could ever imagine.
Secondly, I must thank CKNX 102FM, easy-listening radio out of Wingham, Ontario, and Cord Dugan for allowmg me the distinction of being their first ever “stringer-for-a-day.” Having been removed as a book author, I was able to return to Justice Kovacs’ courtroom as a member of the Canadian media and witness the “trial” of Karla Homolka.
1 want to thank Associate Chief Justice Patrick LeSage, who officially recognized that people who write books, such as myself, are working for as important a medium of communication as the daily press and tabloids and broadcast media.
My editor and friend Tom Hedley added his style, skill and compassion during the difficult times. Comrade-at-arms Barry Callaghan offered astute perceptions of the world-at-large and the language of stories. I was grateful for their unflagging companionship and encouragement as we all descended to the Seventh Circle.
A special thanks goes to Patrick Watson for his graceful example and understanding of the pressures that both plague and inspire all forms of serious inquiry. Another friend, David Rof-fey, offered support and counsel w^ithout which this book would have never been completed.
I want to break with tradition and thank a number of lawyers. Firstly, John Rosen and his defense team, Tony Bryant and Kim Doyle. Mr. Rosen and Ms. Doyle did much to help me navigate the turbulent waters of law and rancor that swirled
INVISIBLE d.rkness 53I
around this case. Also, George Walker and his wife, Lori. When I most needed to win a bet, Lori obHged.
I also want to thank two defenders whose services were invaluable—Toronto criminal lawyer, Paul Tomlinson and St. Catharines lawyer, John Lefurgey. Mr. Lefurgey’s able representations to Justice Patrick LeSage helped to clear muddied waters and dignify difficult issues with learned and humane argument. I am also indebted to Doug Elliott, who has also spent a difficult and trying three years, for other, even more tragic reasons.
I am indebted to many psychiatrists and psychologists, including Dr. Graham Glancy and Dr. Hans Arndt, for their patience with my interminable questions.
Among the legion of poHce involved in this case many thanks to a few good men: Chief Grant Waddell, Inspector K.R. Davidson, Sergeant Bob Ciupa, Staff Superintendent (retired) Jim Moody and his sons, particularly Sergeant Dan “the Man” Moody, Inspector (retired) William Bowie—all of the Niagara Regional Police force—as well as retired Chief William McCormack, Staff Superintendent (retired) Joe Wolfe, Detective Steve Irwin, and Acting Inspector Mike Sale from the Metropolitan Toronto Police force.
I want to thank Doug Lucas, the now retired Director of the Center for Forensic Sciences of Ontario for his forthrightness.
I am privileged to have many friends in the media: men and women who care deeply about what they do and do it with pure heart and a sense of public responsibility, including Geoff Ellwand, Kirk Makin, the stogie-chompin’ Bennie Chin, Peter Murphy, Gay Abate, Joy Malbon, Barb Brown and expatriate tabloid television sleuth Mary Garofalo, whose hospitaHty and openness made one of my New York trips not only dehghtful, but informative. Thanks also to Anne Swardson and Charlie Trueheart of the Washington Post, who have since been “banished” to Paris, probably as a consequence of their excellent reportage on the Homolka fiasco.
Ther
e are also a number of private citizens who offered their support and hospitality over the past three years, including Jackie Bomber, Bruce Ricker, Investigator King, David Harrison, Alfi-ed Caron, Bill Marshall, William McLaughlin, Clair
Weismann Wilks, Cathy Clyke, Ross Cronk, and Ron Moor. Nigel Dickson graciously provided the great photo of John Rosen. I am particularly indebted to my old friend, photographer John Reeves, whose studio became my second home during the long hot summer of 1995.
There are a great number of Niagara Region residents who were both hospitable and helpful. These include the former proprietor of the Parkway Hotel, Convention Center and Bowling Lanes, Archie Katzman, and Mark DeMarco and his friend, retired radio reporter par excellence Gerry McAuliffe, whose initial overview of the internecine and diabolical machinations of pohticians and poUce in the Niagara Region stood me in good stead. Tim Rigby’s able explanations of the esoter-ica of skulling and the Henley Regatta were a delightfril sidebar. T.K. and all the staff of Bistro 990 were pillars of strength, and I also thank Blue Mermaid stalwarts Nick, Karen and Tammy for offering a haven in a heartless world. And of course Nikki, wherever you are—thank you for your second sight.
Invisible darkness : the strange case of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka Page 53