“For inside a vehicle, yes. I’ve never seen that many within a vehicle. Generally, I might get a few on the stick shift or steering wheel.”
“Would it change if there were more than one shot?”
“No, because I can’t distinguish,” says Gerard, explaining that it’s not a linear process. Firing a gun twice wouldn’t necessarily double the amount of GSR. “The number of particles generally doesn’t tell you how many shots were fired. The number of particles produced on any one discharge is a random chaotic event.”
—
IN PARALLEL WITH THE work being done by the scientists at the Centre of Forensic Sciences, specialists from the OPP’s technological crimes unit and Hamilton Police conducted extensive searches on Millard’s and Smich’s various computers, tablets, and phones. The OPP team was led by Detective Sergeant Jim Falconer, who searched for evidence on the four computers and one USB hard drive seized from Millard’s Maple Gate home. Another member of Falconer’s team worked on an iPad and BlackBerry belonging to Mark Smich. Hamilton Police were responsible for Millard’s phone, as well as Hagerman’s, Michalski’s, Noudga’s, Meneses’s, and Daly’s, among others. To examine a computer, the first thing investigators do is make a true copy, or what they refer to as “an image.” For phones, it is often not possible to do this, and they have to perform what is known as an extraction. Extracting data from phones and mobile devices involves more variables and is a far more complex process than taking an image from computers. In all cases, to ensure that the original is kept intact, police work only with the copy.
Once it has been confirmed that a computer copy has been made correctly, forensics officers assess the best type of software to use based on usage patterns. In the case of Millard’s Maple Gate computers, a decision was made to use C4All, a program developed by the OPP to search for picture and movie files, and Internet Evidence Finder (IEF), a commercial program sold by Magnet Forensics. “It’s very efficient at searching computer data for internet browsing and electronic communications,” including browser history, messaging programs, and Facebook activity, Falconer tells the court. “It wraps it all up in a nice package.”
Then it’s time for human beings to review the data. In this case, there were five OPP employees working for roughly two and a half months under Falconer’s supervision on the Bosma, Babcock, and Wayne Millard investigations. The final report presented at trial represents the fruits of their work in regard to the Bosma murder.
The report corroborates much of the testimony heard in court. For example, Falconer’s team found that dating back to November 2012 there was extensive evidence of internet browsing for a Dodge Ram truck on Millard’s computers. There were also photos of the yellow-and-black toolbox that held the gun; video of the Eliminator, taken in September 2012; invoices for Villada Homes; and information about Millardair and other Millard properties.
—
ONE OF JIM FALCONER’S key findings relates to the Walther PPK the prosecution believes was used to kill Tim Bosma and then transferred to Mark Smich in the toolbox. The backup files for text messages sent and received by “Dell’s iPhone,” which Falconer recovered from one of the Maple Gate computers, showed a series of conversations between Millard and Matthew Ward-Jackson, a drug and gun dealer who went by the name of “Iish,” or “Iisho.” Millard had met Ward-Jackson through Mark Smich, who had gone to Catholic elementary school with him in Mississauga in the 1990s. Ward-Jackson loved low-rider cars, Hispanic gangs, and tattoos, which he had all over his body, including on his face. Like Smich, he was an aspiring rapper, most recently using the identity Krucifix14. Many of his friends and hangers-on had no idea what his real name even was.
On February 5, 2012, when Ward-Jackson texted Millard asking for Smich’s new phone number, his real name showed up on Millard’s screen. A few days later, when Millard contacted him about buying a gun, he texted, “Jackson? that your last name?”
“Yea,” Ward-Jackson acknowledged, before providing the details of the gun: “Walther pk 9mill tomorow 2200? Proper one.”
Millard asked him if he could come down on the $2,200 price and if it included ammunition.
“Na walther is a really proper wanted one. And yes I can give y grains. I tlked the guy down from 25 cuz I thought ya wouldn’t wanna spend that. I can get him to bring me it now would u like it foreal?”
“Let’s do it,” said Millard. “pick it up tonight?”
“Can u be at my house soon? Lakeshore one?”
“30-40 mins. send me the address, encase I mix up which building.”
Ward-Jackson pushed for the habitually late Millard to be punctual. “5:30 at 2537 lakeshore. 22 cash plz I’m doing ya a big favor trust. I’m not making a penny. My guys comn from niagara so plz be on time. I don’t wanna look stoopid.”
“I’ll be there,” Millard promised.
At 5:50, Ward-Jackson asked Millard if he was close by, to which Millard answered he was. At 6:22, Ward-Jackson texted that the Niagara guy was late but would be at his house in ten minutes.
“K,” answered Millard. “I have till 7.”
“Yea ill be there in a second and ima hop in ya car and im off to niagara ima pay dude myself. So just have it counted I gotta run. And its legit u won’t have problems if u need lessons tomorow I’m free and we can go over every piece ok?”
“it’s counted,” said Millard. “yea going over it tomorrow sometime after 2pm is good.”
Ward-Jackson brought the gun down to Millard’s car at 6:45. A few minutes later, after they had parted company, it dawned on Millard that he had forgotten an important question about the gun and whether it could be traced to any past crimes. “btw is it clean or dirty,” he texted Ward-Jackson.
“Clean,” came the reply.
The next day, February 13, Millard messaged, “this afternoon still good for grabbing grain?” He was referring to bullets.
Ward-Jackson said it was.
Millard said he would eat and then stop by.
“Yeah come to royal york and dundas. Td bank,” said Ward-Jackson, adding that this was his second home, or “base.” The TD branch was the closest landmark.
Millard arrived at 6:30 and texted that he was parked on a side street.
“Yes sir, see my benz parked across the street. park beside it and ill send butler dude down.”
Millard didn’t see Ward-Jackson’s Mercedes. “have your butler scoop me inside the td entrance, I need to use the ATM anyways,” he said.
“Its directly across the street,” said Ward-Jackson about his car.
“omg I’m on bloor, fml,” texted Millard. He’d shown up at the wrong place.
When Millard pulled up outside Ward-Jackson’s home five minutes later, Ward-Jackson sent his “butler” down. This was Joseph Michael Horth, known to Ward-Jackson’s crowd as Spiken Mike. Horth was a small fifty-something man who had fallen on hard times, lost his teeth to crystal meth, and supposedly been rescued from a life of homelessness by Ward-Jackson. In return, Horth did Ward-Jackson’s bidding. Sometimes, this was indeed butler-type work, like fetching Millard and cigarettes for the boss. At other times, it involved physically punishing activities, like hanging on to the wheels of souped-up trucks and going for a few slow revolutions around the parking lot or being strapped to their roofs for a bumpy ride. These feats, carried out for the entertainment of others, were videotaped and posted to YouTube to preserve the moment. There is even a video where Horth is assaulted and abused on camera. He is given a shot of alcohol before facing punishment for supposedly failing at his butler duties. Then he is kicked in the testicles by a man whose face is not shown. There is laughter from onlookers off-camera. Afterward, as Horth is doubled over in pain, hugging a dog for comfort, he is given another shot of booze to help him recover. All the while, he recites that he deserves to be punished.
On this particular evening, however, all Horth had to do was escort Millard from his car to Ward-Jackson’s living room for his gun instruction. �
�I’m chilling,” Millard texted the butler’s boss, who had not yet arrived. “I await your presence.”
From the lack of texts over the next few hours, it appears that Millard and Ward-Jackson spent the evening together. In the early hours of February 14, after leaving his gun dealer’s base, Millard texted Ward-Jackson, “btw happy Valentine’s day.” He also snapped some pictures of his new Walther PPK, which Falconer would later uncover in a folder labelled “DellsHard/Pictures.” The embedded GPS metadata shows that the photos were taken near his Maple Gate home.
Several months later, on September 22, 2012, again in the early morning hours, Millard sent another photo of what is presumably the same Walther PPK—which is famous for, among other things, being James Bond’s gun of choice—to Christina Noudga. It was found in the backup file for her iPhone on a laptop computer seized from Millard’s bedroom.
A third photo was discovered in yet another backup file on one of the Maple Gate computers, this one for a device labelled “Mark’s Ipad [sic].” The “start date,” or first syncing with the computer, of Mark’s iPad is recorded as having occurred on July 5, 2012, shortly after the disappearance of Laura Babcock, who had been loaned Shawn Lerner’s iPad. The last backup of that device to Millard’s computer is on January 2013. Its serial number shows it is the same iPad that was seized from Mark Smich’s mother’s house on the day of his arrest. The original gun photo, which was taken with the iPad, had been deleted from the device by the time Smich was arrested, but the backup photo shows part of a gun that resembles a Walther PPK being held by two grubby fingers with dirty fingernails and a freckle on the index finger between the nail and the first joint. Barely visible in the bottom left corner is a partially covered face that appears disproportionately small due to the perspective. Falconer says the person’s clothing—what looks like a grey hoodie—and facial hair on the upper lip led him to believe it is Mark Smich. Another photo on the iPad shows Smich has a freckle on his index finger.
The photos recovered demonstrate that both Millard and Smich had handled the Walther PPK that the police believe was used to kill Tim Bosma.
—
ON FEBRUARY 18, 2014, ONE of Millard’s Valentine’s Day gun photos was sent by email to Christianne Lys, a Toronto Police supervisor in Forensic Identification Services, who has specialized in fingerprints since 2003. The original photo showed part of a hand holding a gun including a very clear finger pad. Lys received this image of a finger, but she was not given any information about the case it related to. Her task was to try to find the person’s identity by analyzing the ridges on the finger in the photograph.
Lys has worked with digital images of fingers before and says that, depending on a number of factors, including the resolution of the photograph, it’s possible to make an identification. A good-quality photograph of a finger, with sufficient clarity and detail to proceed with testing, is sometimes preferable to an actual lifted print. “It can be easier, as it doesn’t have the same distortions,” she tells the jury.
One of the first things Lys did with the image was to reverse it so that the finger had the same orientation as prints in the RCMP’s automated fingerprint identification system. She then marked up the printed photo and submitted it to the database, which uses a matching algorithm to provide a list of twenty possible matching candidates. Lys examined these all by eye. With the best match, there were seventeen points of comparison. She says all seventeen matched the left index finger of Dellen Millard, which had been entered in the database on May 11, 2013. As is standard procedure, Lys’s identification was peer reviewed by another qualified examiner, who agreed with her assessment.
—
CLOSE TO A YEAR after the murder of Tim Bosma, on the morning of April 10, 2014, completely unbeknownst to the press, Dellen Millard and Mark Smich were transported from their respective jails to make an appearance at the Toronto West Court. Millard was charged with the first-degree murders of his father and Laura Babcock, and Smich was charged with the first-degree murder of Laura Babcock. Because there was not a journalist in sight at the strip mall courthouse—located just blocks away from the intersection of Jane and Finch, a neighbourhood synonymous with violence in the minds of many—nothing is known about how the accused reacted to the charges or if any of their family members were present. Their lawyers later informed reporters that their clients intended to plead not guilty to all the charges. Deepak Paradkar, who still represented Millard at the time, pledged to defend him zealously, adding that he didn’t see a “common link” between the three murders for which his client stood accused. Thomas Dungey said nothing other than that his defence would be vigorous.
Unusually, the police did not hold a proper press conference where reporters could ask about the investigations and what led to the new charges. Instead, Staff Inspector Greg McLane of the Toronto Police homicide unit read from the official OPP statement at a media event that lasted just a few minutes. Also contained in the press release was another startling piece of information: police had arrested Millard’s girlfriend, Christina Noudga, who would be charged as an accessory after the fact in the murder of Tim Bosma.
Curiously, the police made no mention of several related charges that had been laid two days earlier, on April 8, against Matthew Ward-Jackson. He was charged not only with selling Millard the Walther PPK in February 2012 but with trafficking him two other guns later that year, including the firearm allegedly used to kill Wayne Millard. At the time he was charged, Ward-Jackson was already in custody for a separate set of charges relating to possession of an AK-47. He had been arrested in January 2014 and denied bail.
On the same day the new charges were laid against Millard and Smich, Noudga was taken to Hamilton for questioning while search warrants were executed at her home, where she lived with her parents and younger brother and sister. Although the police had identified Noudga as a key figure in the case early on, she had always declined to talk to them and lawyered up soon after her boyfriend’s arrest. Her lawyer, Paul Mergler, declined to comment on the charges against her.
—
THE DAY AFTER CHRISTINA NOUDGA’S arrest, she appeared at Hamilton’s John Sopinka Courthouse to hear the charges against her. She was variously described by reporters as nervous, scared, and pensive. She wore a brown leather jacket, turquoise T-shirt, and black pants. She bit her lip and fidgeted as she stood in the prisoner’s box. The Crown stated that the charges against her stemmed from actions she took on Thursday, May 9, 2013, when she allegedly assisted her boyfriend, Dellen Millard, in covering up the murder of Tim Bosma.
Sitting five metres away from Noudga in the front row of the courtroom was Sharlene Bosma. She watched the brief proceedings stoically, but later, outside the courtroom, she broke down in tears. Although the police had informed her two days earlier of the impending arrest, she was still shocked by it, and seeing Noudga in person had taken its toll. After composing herself, she spoke with reporters for a minute or two. “I’m not sure that I can take any more surprises,” she said, standing on the courthouse steps. It was a beautiful early spring day, much like the one on which her husband had gone missing. “I always say that everybody has so much that they can take, and I’m reaching the limit. And I just hope that this is it. That we’re done now.”
TWELVE
THE GIRLFRIENDS
Until she was arrested, Christina Noudga refused to talk to police about what happened in May 2013. She appeared not to be bothered that a man had been murdered, that her boyfriend was in jail, and that she had information critical to the case. It took the realization that she was finally being charged as an “accessory after the fact to murder” to convince her to make a statement.
“I had plans to go abroad, get on with my life,” she tells the Crown’s Tony Leitch.
“This is Dell’s mess, not mine,” she later explains to Thomas Dungey.
As Noudga sees it, she’s been unjustly humiliated in public and by the courts. “I’m arrested for what?” she
asks. “For something stupid that maybe [Dellen] and Mark did.”
Only once in her five days of testimony does Noudga mention Tim Bosma’s name. Never once, as she sits in the witness box facing the victim’s mother, father, and widow, does she show any hint of empathy or remorse. She displays no awareness of how offensive it is to describe a man’s cold-blooded murder as “something stupid” and a “mess,” an annoyance that has interfered with her plans, something that has caused her to be charged—wrongly, as she sees it—as an accessory after the fact to murder.
At the time of her testimony, Noudga’s own trial is scheduled to take place a few months later, in November 2016. As a result, she asks for protection under the Canada Evidence Act. Unlike in the United States, where witnesses can refuse to answer questions by pleading the Fifth Amendment, in Canada they must answer or face possible charges for contempt of court. Any evidence Noudga gives at the trial of Dellen Millard and Mark Smich, however, cannot be used against her at her own trial. Unless she perjures herself or gives contradictory testimony, she is protected by the Evidence Act from incriminating herself. At her own trial, of course, she cannot be compelled to testify.
When Noudga arrives at court for her first day on the witness stand, she does not disappoint the photographers and TV crews waiting to capture her entrance. She and her mother, who holds her daughter’s arm, both wear long dark coats and mirrored sunglasses to hide from the cameras. In Noudga’s case, she has draped a black-and-white print scarf around her head as if she were an Islamic woman forbidden from revealing her face in public. Her mother opts for a toque-style hat pulled down over her forehead and a winter scarf wrapped around her lower face. The unseasonably cold April weather helps make them look marginally less ridiculous.
Under her coat, for her first day of testimony, Noudga is wearing a cream-coloured blouse, a black pencil skirt slit up the back, and maroon suede stilettos. She is tall and slim with excellent posture and walks speedily to the witness box even in heels. Although she doesn’t appear nervous, when the court registrar asks if she wants to be sworn on the Bible or to solemnly affirm, she answers, “Yes.”
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