Travis Edward Vader, 38, is seen in this undated handout photo. Edmonton's chief Crown prosecutor admits the case against Travis Vader was circumstantial, but is denying she stayed murder charges against him so RCMP would have longer to investigate and gather evidence. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO - RCMP
December 01, 2015 - 6:40 PM
EDMONTON - Edmonton's chief Crown prosecutor admits the case against Travis Vader was circumstantial, but is denying she stayed murder charges against him so RCMP would have longer to investigate and gather evidence.
At a pre-trial hearing on Tuesday, Michelle Doyle denied a suggestion by Vader's lawyer, Brian Beresh, that the stay was a convenient excuse to buy more time.
Vader, 43, was first charged in 2012 with two counts of first-degree murder in the 2010 deaths of Lyle and Marie McCann, an elderly Edmonton-area couple who vanished while on a trip to British Columbia.
But the charges were stayed in March 2014.
Nine months later, the charges were re-laid and a trial before a judge alone is scheduled for March 2016.
On Tuesday, Beresh produced an email from an RCMP officer, dated the day after the stay had been issued, suggesting "disclosure issues" were at least partly behind the stay and saying the Crown wanted to bring the charges back to court as soon as possible.
Doyle said she doesn't know the officer who wrote the memo and doesn't know where he got the information from, but it wasn't from her.
Beresh is arguing there has been an abuse of process by the Crown and has asked the charges again be stayed, or at least that any evidence gathered in the nine months between the stay being issued and the charges being re-activated not be allowed at trial.
For its part, the Crown has admitted Vader’s Charter rights have been “clearly breached by the delay” but says the case should continue because of the serious nature of the charges and the interest of society in seeing the case go to trial.
The McCanns, both in their 70s, were last seen fuelling up their motorhome in their hometown of St. Albert, a bedroom community north of Edmonton, in July 2010. They were on their way to a family camping trip in British Columbia.
Their burned out motorhome was discovered west of Edmonton a few days after they were last seen. Their bodies have never been found.
(CTV Edmonton)
News from © The Canadian Press, 2015