Murder at McDonald's

by Jessome, Phonse;

  Brian Williston’s voice wavered as he became choked by emotion. Many of the relatives of the four victims wept openly but quietly in the court as they listened to Julia’s letter. Their hearts went out to the fatherless boy and the young mother.

  Justin knows how his father was killed and that he is in heaven. It is very difficult to explain to a four-year-old what heaven is. He asks questions like, ‘Does Daddy sleep in a bed? Is he hungry? What does he wear?’ My heart breaks, every time he asks one of these questions. Very often Justin has to be reassured that the “bad men” that killed Daddy are in jail, and the police threw away the key so they cannot get out. I am sure he is afraid they will hurt or kill us.

  On June 20 of this year, while most young women with small children took their husbands out to dinner for Father’s Day, Justin and I went to Neil’s grave and placed flowers.

  Neil’s death was so senseless, and when he died part of us died with him. The pain of losing a loved one to such a violent death will remain with us forever.

  Neil’s plans and dreams for a long happy life ended at the hands of Darren Muise.… Darren Muise has admitted to murdering Neil, and now it is time for him to pay for what he did.

  Julia concluded her letter by asking Justice Kelly to impose the maximum sentence—no parole for twenty-five years—and Marc Chisholm echoed the sentiment as he began his final arguments. He said Muise committed the crime for the simple pleasure of doing it, and described the eighteen-year-old killer as a self-centred, shallow, spoiled, and greedy individual, who first told lies, and then tried to create sympathy for himself. The prosecutor quoted from a presentence report in which Muise told a social worker that he longed to wake up in a “normal,” rich family with “normal” problems. Chisholm pointed out how loving and supportive Muise’s parents were, and questioned how the young man could claim his problems were in part a product of the family’s financial difficulties—or, as Muise suggested in the report, the result of all the time he spent at the pool hall with what he described as a less-than-enlightened crowd. Chisholm told the judge that when Muise cut Neil Burroughs’s throat, he committed a crime that was even more heinous than shooting someone. He ended his summation by asking the judge to impose the maximum term on a second-degree murder conviction—life with no parole for twenty-five years. If Kelly agreed, he would become only the second judge in Canadian history to impose such a term.

  I returned to the station to do a live update on the one o’clock news. As I quoted from Julia Burroughs’s statement, and got to the part where her son began asking those heartbreaking questions about his father, I had to stop talking. The camera was a metre away, and could not pick up the tears in my eyes; and the anchor in Halifax took the pause as his opportunity to ask me about the issues being debated in court. It was a good thing that he asked that question, because it allowed me to compose myself. That was the first time in my thirteen years as a reporter that I had succumbed to emotion while doing my job. But the image of the innocent child asking if his daddy had a bed in heaven was simply too powerful. Neil Burroughs was only a few years younger than me, and we both had young families. From the moment he was identified as a victim, and I learned he had a child, I felt a connection to him. I don’t think the knowledge influenced my reporting—at least, not until that news broadcast—but I have to admit that it played on my mind from time to time. It was difficult to understand how a young man trying to support his family could be gunned down for no reason. I knew why Justin Burroughs’s question had upset me, but I was angry with myself for letting it happen, and promised myself to remain focused as I continued to cover the story.

  It would not be easy: Gary and I returned to court only to be met by yet another intensely emotional situation. In the days between the Wood trial and the Muise sentencing, Arlene MacNeil had been transferred from Halifax to a hospital in Cape Breton, not far from her home. When we walked back into the courthouse, there was Arlene in the hallway, sitting in a wheelchair beside her mother. Germaine MacNeil called me over; we had become friendly during the Wood trial, when I tried to answer her questions about the legal process, and now she wanted me to meet her daughter. In the year since the shootings, I had often looked at the photographs of the four shooting victims—but now I saw a very different Arlene MacNeil. The stunning beauty with the brilliant smile, whose graduation picture I had shown on TV countless times, had been replaced by a disabled and disfigured young woman, her head shorn of the long black curls that gave her such a confident appearance in her school photo. Arlene’s speech was laboured and difficult to understand, but that I could make out what she was saying was in itself a miracle. She was alive, and she could speak. I knelt beside her wheelchair and took hold of the hand she offered as she greeted me: “Hi, how are you?”

  Arlene MacNeil and the author exchange a thumbs-up signal outside the courtroom during the sentencing hearing for Darren Muise. [Print from ATV video tape.]

  “I’m fine, Arlene, how are you?” One side of her face was now contorted in a grimace; one eye drifted slightly; and her close-cropped hair was silent testimony to the brain surgery she had undergone. Yet Arlene MacNeil was truly beautiful; she radiated strength and purity, and the innocence of a child. Clinging to my hand, she smiled, looking from her mother to this stranger her mom said she had been watching on TV. Then she released her grip and gave me the thumbs-up signal, which was captured by the cameras—an eloquent image of the courage and determination that kept Arlene fighting to regain more of her life each and every day. Seeing Arlene and listening to the painful letter written by Julia Burroughs drove home a powerful message: the victims of this crime were innocent people who had done nothing to deserve the pain that had been brought into their lives.

  Arlene was rolled into the courtroom, and when Joel Pink came in and saw her, his expression changed from a cheerful grin to a look of concern; he turned and left the room. Was he going to ask that Arlene MacNeil be removed from the courtroom? It is highly unlikely that he would even have contemplated making such a request, but it is almost certain that he prepared his client for her presence. Since the courtroom door was being kept open because of the heat and humidity, I asked Gary to record the procession of officers leading Muise to his seat, and to include Arlene in the shot. Her wheelchair was placed near the door between the camera and the seat Muise would occupy, and I wanted to know how he would react to seeing her. But it never happened. Darren Muise, who had been walking so tall, and staring out into the gallery each time he entered the courtroom, now lowered his head as he followed the deputies to the prisoner’s bench. He did not see Arlene MacNeil, and shortly afterwards her mother rolled her back to the hallway, where her father was waiting to take her back to the hospital.

  Like the prosecutor, Joel Pink had to ignore the emotions in the room in order to do his job effectively. And he did, painting a picture of his client that sharply contrasted with the image created by Marc Chisholm. Even their physical impact was a contrast—the tall, slender prosecutor and the short, stocky defence attorney, leaning forward slightly, his left hand against his hip. Pink’s right hand was always moving, as he picked up a piece of paper from the table in front of him and stabbed the air with it for emphasis, then dropped the page back on the table and ran his hand over his bald head, exaggerating the deep-set lines in his brow. Muise’s lawyer pointed to his client’s youth, and the likelihood that he could turn himself around; he insisted Muise had intended to rob, not to kill; he even downplayed the knife wound, telling the judge his client had only inflicted slight cuts on the side of the victim’s neck. Pink drew no sympathy from the gallery when he told the judge how his client had cried during sessions with a forensic psychiatrist at the correctional centre in Halifax; nor when he informed the court that as Darren Muise sat in a courtroom, his former girlfriend was preparing for her graduation prom. The relatives of the victim were shocked to hear the lawyer list case after case of brutal murders for which criminals had received jail terms of life
with parole after twelve or fifteen years. Could the courts be that lenient? By the time the defence lawyer had finished, many in the courtroom were sure that Muise would get a parole eligibility term ranging from ten to fifteen years—nowhere near the maximum. And this despite the Crown’s convincing arguments that each case must be judged on merit, that Darren Muise must be sentenced for what he did.

  With the legal arguments complete, Justice Kelly asked Darren Muise if he had anything to say on his own behalf. Unlike Wood, he did: Muise had stayed awake in his cell the night before, writing a letter expressing his feelings, and even practising it on the guard. Now he had his chance to tell the court how he felt. Members of the victims’ families leaned forward to listen, as the clean-cut young man stood to speak. Muise faced Justice Kelly, but his words were for those seated behind him in the court. His voice did not quaver, and while he sounded rehearsed, he also sounded as though he meant what he was saying: “I would like to express sympathy to Julia and Justin Burroughs … I pray the hurt may subside. I know nothing I say or do can make that happen. I accept responsibility for what I did and understand your hatred. I am not a callous murderer and not without conscience. I have made a grave mistake and I will pay. I wish I could take his place. I did not want anyone to get hurt.” Although he was not being sentenced for the shootings of the three other victims, Muise also spoke to their families, but without implicating himself. “What they did was wrong,” he said. “I pray for Arlene and offer sympathy to the others. I would like to say I’m sorry to my family and friends. I am not the person painted to you by the Crown. I have cried not because of my predicament, but for the sorrow I have caused.”

  Muise’s comments marked the end of the hearing. Justice Kelly needed time to make his decision, but he didn’t want to make things harder on anyone by delaying the sentencing, so he took the unusual step of scheduling a court session for Saturday morning. That way he could spend the night writing out the reasons for his decision, but not put the families of the victims through a weekend of wondering and second-guessing. Julia Burroughs stopped me as I walked out of the courthouse. “What did you think of that?” she asked.

  “Of what he had to say?”

  “Yes, do you think the judge will believe that?”

  “Did you?”

  “No, it was nothing but bullshit. He’s just trying to make himself look good.”

  “I guess I can say you don’t accept his apology?” Julia stepped a little closer, putting her hand on my arm and lowering her voice to a conspiratorial tone. “If you want to make me happy, you can say he’s a bullshitter and a bastard. Just don’t say I said it.”

  “I’ll paraphrase that. See you in the morning.” At the close of my report that night, I told the audience that the widow of Neil Burroughs did not accept the apology offered by Darren Muise, and that she considered it contrived and self-serving. Julia later said she appreciated the diplomatic translation.

  Saturday, June 26, was a sunny, warm day, but the weather did nothing to reduce the stress that Julia and the other relatives were feeling as they entered the Cape Breton County Courthouse yet again. Nor did the mood improve when they were greeted by yet another display of intense courtroom security. The outburst two days before had convinced court officers that emotions at this hearing were running a little too high and that extreme measures would be needed at the moment of sentencing. The sheriff’s deputies had become friendly with many of the victims’ relatives over the past weeks, and these officers were quite aware that many of the relatives were still angry about Muise’s deal. If he also was given a light parole-eligibility term, this would likely bring on another outcry, perhaps even a physical confrontation. Gary and I stood chatting with guards downstairs at the prisoners entrance, waiting for the van from the correctional centre. The guards were speculating on what term the judge might impose, and they hoped it would be a long one; they did not want to have to restrain anyone.

  As Justice Kelly took his seat, a deputy stood near the bench; two others sat with Darren Muise; and eight officers, mostly RCMP, lined the front row of the public gallery. Meanwhile, Sydney police were in place outside the court to ensure that the prisoner would leave without incident. These measures annoyed the law-abiding citizens who were there to hear the sentencing of the criminal who had deeply affected their lives. “What are they expecting, some kind of attack?” Al Fagan asked, pointing out the extra precautions. “This is ridiculous.” The victims’ relatives knew the security was in place to keep them away from Muise, and it made them feel dirty—they felt they were being treated as though they were a danger to society, although they had done nothing to break the law. The tension in the courtroom was high as the judge began to read his decision. Like most judges, Justice Kelly took a fair amount of time to outline the factors influencing his decision. Many in the court fidgeted and shifted in the uncomfortable wooden chairs as they tried to see where the judge was headed with his dissertation. At times, the victims’ relatives would stare at each other in disbelief as the judge appeared to be leaning towards a light sentence. At one point, he described Muise as “an undirected teen hanging out at a pool hall, playing games. [It was] an aimless, pointless existence, but not a problem to the community. His actions were out of character.” Then, the relatives would see a glimmer of hope: “His actions before during and after the crime show a high degree of criminality.”

  Darren Muise, looking clean-cut in a fashionable suit, arrives in court to face his sentencing. [Print from ATV video tape.]

  Justice Kelly made it clear he did not accept the statement Muise made in his confession—that he had cut Neil Burroughs’s throat to help him by causing a quick death. Instead the judge called the action “a cold, calculated, extremely brutal act, exposing a personality without conscience, or out of touch—either way a danger to society.” The judge pointed to the moment when Derek Wood shot Arlene MacNeil, saying that Muise could have tried to stop Wood; or he could have helped Donna Warren escape when Wood ran upstairs. He said Muise expected violence and was prepared to use it when he entered the restaurant. But then, Justice Kelly outlined the legal factors he had to consider, and Neil Burroughs’s relatives began to despair again. The judge said he found only one case of second-degree murder that carried a parole eligibility restriction of more than twenty years, and that restrictions of more than seventeen years involved criminals with extensive histories of recidivism.

  By the time the judge neared the end of his prepared statement, sixteen court- and police officers had filed into the room. Justice Kelly told Darren Muise to stand, and ordered him to be held in prison for life, without parole eligibility for twenty years. Muise was led away as the victims’ relatives crowded into the hallway, tired and a little baffled. They had wanted a twenty-five year term but were left feeling grateful for the twenty-year sentence. There was none of the spontaneous joy that had erupted when the verdicts were read in the Wood trial, but there was a similar display of anger; a few people gathered outside to yell at Muise as he was led to the waiting prison van. Among them was Julia Burroughs, who shouted “Bastard!” as the vehicle pulled away from the court. She wanted to do more, say more, but she felt helpless. And the van was gone.

  Fifteen

  As Darren Muise was on his way to prison that sunny Saturday afternoon, the victims’ relatives gathered in the courthouse parking lot to discuss the final court case. They would all be coming back in September to attend the trial of Freeman MacNeil, and they hoped no deals would be made in the weeks ahead to allow MacNeil to avoid a first-degree murder conviction. That didn’t happen, but something almost as frustrating did. At the conclusion of the Wood and Muise trials, and in the wake of the intense publicity that surrounded them, MacNeil’s lawyer, Kevin Coady, applied for a change of venue. Ken Haley told me privately that he thought the application would probably succeed. When William Kelly agreed to hear the Muise case with no jury, he pretty much tied the hands of Justice David Gruchey, who would preside ov
er the MacNeil trial. It would be tough for the new judge to say that MacNeil could find an impartial jury in Cape Breton after Justice Kelly had found that Muise probably could not have. In fact, Gruchey did order the change of venue: MacNeil’s trial would be held in Halifax. This outraged the MacNeil, Warren, Burroughs, and Fagan families. Why should they have to leave home for weeks in order to see justice done for their loved ones? A few philanthropic Nova Scotia corporations agreed, and offers of free accommodations and air fare were soon made; the provincial attorney-general’s department also gave some assistance by coordinating a program designed to make the change of venue easier on the families from Cape Breton.

  For me, Justice Gruchey’s decision proved to be an ironic coincidence. After the Muise trial, I was asked by the network to accept a new posting in Halifax, and although that meant I would not be covering the McDonald’s story, I accepted the transfer. In August, my wife and I were driving along a highway outside Halifax, on a house-hunting expedition, when a radio newscast reported the change of venue in MacNeil’s forthcoming trial. I looked at my wife and smiled as the announcer said that the trial would begin September 8—the same day I was to begin working in the Halifax newsroom.

  Kevin Coady and his colleague Marguerite MacNeil work on their arguments in favour of having Freeman MacNeil’s trial moved to Halifax. They won that battle. [Print from ATV video tape.]