Man confessed to murder, trial hears
Accused in the killing of his mother
A man accused of murdering his mom threatened to blow up the family home in Vancouver’s Dunbar neighbourhood during a standoff with police and later confessed that he had killed “the witch.”
On the first day of his trial Monday, Brian Whitlock pleaded not guilty to the second-degree murder of his mother, Barbara Whitlock, on Nov. 8, 2014.
In his opening statement, Crown counsel Elliot Poll said police were alerted after Brian’s brother, Spencer Whitlock, arrived at the home at 3171 West 23rd Ave. to collect some belongings and discovered a body in the backyard.
“He did not know who it was or if it was a man or a woman,” Poll told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Joyce DeWitt-Van Oosten. “He noted that the person had lost blood and that the person was either dead or unconscious.”
Poll said that after making his observations, Spencer walked to the bottom of the stairs leading to a patio, where he saw his brother, Brian.
“The accused said to him, ‘You know where mom is? I’m looking for her. I just got here,’ ” said the prosecutor.
After speaking to his brother, Spencer left the home and tried to call his mom, who did not answer, and then tried to call his stepfather in Hawaii before getting hold of police. When cops arrived, they found the mom’s body in the northwest corner of the yard and used a loud hailer to try to get Brian to come out of the house.
“During the standoff, the accused yelled that ‘She’s dead. She’s dead!’ ” said Poll. “He invited police in so that he could kill them. He threatened to blow up the house. In that regard, police officers could smell gas from the house and had to turn off the gas.”
During the standoff, which continued until the following morning, Brian was seen doing what turned out to be extensive damage to the house, said the Crown.
Eventually, a police emergency response team entered the home and arrested the accused. He had a “significant” amount of blood on him, in particular blood on his side and arm, Poll said.
The Crown said that after the accused was taken to jail, he told an officer, “Yeah, I killed the witch.”
Poll told the judge that when police searched the home, they found inscribed on the wall the words “I killed Barbie.” He said the accused referred to his mom as Barbie.
Police found a splitting maul on the front steps of the residence that Poll described as the murder weapon. There were also a number of knives found inside and outside the residence, including a meat cleaver in the sink with red liquid on it.
“The Crown’s theory is that a knife was used to inflict some of the significant injuries to the body of Ms. Whitlock,” said Poll. A pathologist will testify that the main cause of death was “blunt and sharp-force” injuries to the victim’s head and neck, he said.
In summer 2012, Brian used a baseball bat to beat his two-year-old German shepherd, Captain, and left the dog for dead in a Kitsilano dumpster. Whitlock, who was 26 at the time, received a 60-day jail sentence and a lifetime ban on owning animals after pleading guilty to animal cruelty.
Mental-health records cited in the animal-cruelty case indicated he’d been diagnosed with psychosis and schizophrenia.