Former officer paints a picture of a serial killer

By IAN ROBERTSON, QMI Agency

Last Updated: 12th February 2010, 8:58pm


A sexual deviant who binds and takes photos of female victims as souvenirs is “the worst of the worst,” a private investigator and ex-Toronto Police detective says.

Such men often have a “trophy collection,” former Det.-Sgt. Dave Perry said in an interview.

And the veteran of some of the city’s worst sex and homicide cases, now CEO of ISN Investigative Solutions Network Inc., said such offenders usually start young.

While emotional and sexual gratification are key motives, Perry said, attackers rarely take captive photos.

The danger of them escaping detection is what starts teens fantasizing about assaults that can escalate over many years into physical contact, rape and murder, “because what used to work doesn’t any more,” he said.

Behavioural experts say trophies include peeping toms seeking personal items such as panties belonging to women they secretly observe and taking them from washing lines, laundry dryers or homes during break-ins.

Psychological and behavioural profiling of offences and offenders became a valuable tool years ago in helping predict a low-level offender’s likelihood of becoming a serial stalker and for revisiting unsolved cases, Perry said.

“But it’s not an absolute science,” he cautioned. “When you try to figure out a sexual offender, you could go crazy.”

Since the arrest this week of Col. Russell Williams, until recently commander of 8 Wing at CFB Trenton, families of unsolved sex crime victims have had their hopes raised, urging police to revisit those cases.

Similar demands were made after the arrest of Scarborough rapist Paul Bernardo, who was convicted in 1995 of the murders of teens Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French after he moved to St. Catharines.

The OPP has asked police in Toronto, Manitoba and the Maritimes — where Williams has lived — to wait for its behavioural science analysis service team’s profile, which could take several months.

Asking to reopen cold cases now “is a natural reaction,” Perry said.

But, he said, “people have to calm down and relax.

“There are a lot of sex offenders out there, who haven’t been caught, and you only want to use evidence to rule somebody in or out,” Perry said. “To jump to conclusions and pile it all on one man is negligent.”

He praised the OPP team, which helped him in such high-profile cases as the 2003 rape, murder and dismemberment of Holly Jones, 10.

Michael Briere, the only neighbour to refuse a police DNA request, pleaded guilty to her slaying.

Perry said he earlier rewrote the sex crimes unit manual, requiring the force to consult it on non-intercourse cases with warning signs of a possible sex offender.

DNA comparisons are essential, but since the national databank was only created in 2000, older cases are more difficult to match to a suspect.

Canadian police need a warrant or post-conviction order to get a suspect’s DNA.

But Perry said Toronto Police have obtained “cast-off samples” from public places, where an officer has observed and seized a suspect’s discarded cigarette butt, drinking glass or pop container.

Williams, 46, who used the name Sovka at Birchmount Park Collegiate Institute and Upper Canada College while living in Scarborough in the late 1970s and 1980s, is charged with murdering two women.

A funeral service will be held Saturday for Jessica Lloyd, 27, whose body was found Monday near Belleville.

Cpl. Marie-France Comeau, 38, was murdered in November in her Brighton home, west of Trenton.

An avid photographer, Williams is also charged with the forcible confinement of two women in Tweed, a village northeast of Belleville, two break and enters and their sexual assaults.

The OPP said a home invader awakened each survivor, raped and tied them up, then took their photos.

Search warrants police obtained for William’s bungalow in Tweed cited lingerie, baby blankets and computer data storage devices. Ottawa police also searched the trendy Westboro neighbourhood home shared with his wife, Elizabeth Harriman.

In custody at the Quinte Detection Centre in Napanee, east of Belleville, his next court appearance is Thursday in Belleville, via a video link.

ian.robertson@sunmedia.ca