Jury sees Garnier interview
Off-duty officer’s accused killer shown crying in video with police interrogator
A Halifax jury was shown a video of a sobbing Christopher Garnier being interviewed by police following his arrest in the killing of an off-duty police officer.
RCMP Cpl. Jody Allison told the Nova Scotia Supreme Court Monday that he interviewed Garnier on the afternoon of Sept. 16, 2015, after he had been arrested in the death of Const. Catherine Campbell.
The video shows Garnier, dressed in a T-shirt and pants, walking into an interview room with grey walls, two computer chairs and a table.
He can be seen sobbing and sniffling as Allison speaks to him in a comforting tone, with the officer telling Garnier, “I don’t think it was your intention for it to end up like it did.”
Allison told Garnier that his background as a firefighter and in occupational health and safety shows that he’s a “good guy.”
“The safety-minded people? They are the ones that have a good heart,” Allison tells Garnier during the interrogation.
He noted that Campbell was a volunteer firefighter, and said: “Same thing as you - good people.”
In the first 20 minutes of the 9.5-hour-long interview, Garnier sat with his hands on his lap and virtually said nothing, other than to ask if his father had been notified.
Garnier has pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder and interfering with a dead body.
The Crown alleges the 30-year-old punched and strangled Campbell, a Truro, N.S., officer, inside a McCully Street apartment and dumped her body on a steep embankment near Halifax’s Macdonald Bridge.
Evidence presented at the trial has indicated Campbell was seen kissing and dancing with a man who bar staff identified as Garnier before leaving with him in the early hours of Sept. 11, 2015.
Earlier Monday, the jury was shown the clothing Campbell was wearing when her body was found in thick brush near the bridge.
Halifax Regional Police Sgt. Andre Habib wore purple latex gloves as he pulled items from bags and held them up for the 14-member jury.
He showed the court a hair clip, a strapless dress and a strapless bra — all items the 36-year-old woman was wearing when her body was found in the early hours of Sept. 16, 2015.
Habib also said that toiletries, clothes and Garnier’s passport were found inside a backpack seized from the Ford Edge he was driving when he was arrested.
The trial has heard the mattress from the pullout couch in the McCully Street apartment was missing.
Habib testified Monday that police never found the mattress.