Courtroom erupts in cheers as killers sentenced

Two men convicted in young woman’s slaying not eligible for parole for 50 years

A packed Toronto courtroom erupted into cheers and a standing ovation Monday after the judge announced two men convicted of murdering a young woman would not be eligible for parole for 50 years.

Dellen Millard is “profoundly amoral and dangerous” while his partner in crime, Mark Smich, “enthusiastically” participated in the murder of Laura Babcock, 23, whose body was never found, Justice Michael Code said. Millard, 32, of Toronto, and Smich, 30, of Oakville, Ont., were convicted in December of murdering the Toronto woman in the summer of 2012 and burning her body in an animal incinerator.

“Justice has been served to the murderers of our cherished daughter, Laura,” Clayton Babcock, the victim’s father, told reporters outside court. “Somehow life in prison seems lenient when Laura didn’t even get to see her 24th birthday.”

Millard and Smich had previously been convicted in the murder of Tim Bosma, a 32-year-old Hamilton father who went missing in May 2013 after going on a test drive with two men interested in buying his pickup truck. That murder trial in 2016 heard the pair burned Bosma’s body in an animal incinerator — called the Eliminator — that belonged to Millard.

“This repetition of two planned and deliberate murders also arguably requires separate punishment to deter potential serial murderers who are thinking of going on to commit a second murder after successfully committing a first murder,” Code told the sentencing hearing Monday as he ordered the life sentences in the two murder cases be served consecutively.

“Millard unsuccessfully attempted to prove that there is a good side to his personality. In my view, Millard is skillful and clever in delivering pro-social behaviour when it is to his advantage. The overwhelming weight of evidence from text messages to his criminal behaviour is that he is profoundly amoral and dangerous.”