Police helicopter tracked Garland as he tried to hide
Infrared video captured triplemurder suspect Douglas Garland crawling through a stand of trees as a rookie Calgary cop moved in to arrest him.
Const. Jamie Parhar, now a threeyear member of the Calgary Police Service, said Thursday she and her partner volunteered to assist investigators tracking Garland in the early morning hours of July 14, 2014.
But by the time Parhar reached the accused killer’s location hiding in a line of trees not far from Garland’s Airdrie farm, she and her partner had become separated.
“Iwasn’tconcerneduntilHAWCS asked me where my backup was, where my partner was,” said Parhar, daughter of deputy police chief Sat Parhar.
That’s when Parhar decided to stop her pursuit and wait for other officers.
She said the HAWCS helicopter, using an infrared camera, was keeping her apprised of where Garland was in what she described as “a very thick wall of trees and shrubbery.”
Soon after, both her partner, Const. Julia Howe, and members of the mobile surveillance team arrived on scene, and Garland soon emerged from his hiding place.
“That’s Mr. Garland,” Parhar said, as Crown prosecutor Vicki Faulkner played video taken from the helicopter.
Parhar then handcuffed the triple-murder suspect. “He was very calm and collected,” she said.
Because the arrest was in Airdrie, Garland was handed over to an RCMP member who transported the accused to Calgary police headquarters.
Faulkner asked her about Garland’s demeanour when she removed the cuffs at arrest processing.
“Hadn’t changed,” Parhar said. “Still very calm.”
Garland, 57, is charged with firstdegree murder in the deaths of Alvin and Kathy Liknes and their young grandson, Nathan O’Brien. Alvin, 66, Kathy, 53, and five-yearold Nathan went missing from the couple’s home the morning of June 30, 2014.
It’s the Crown’s theory Garland violently kidnapped them from the grandparents’ Parkhill residence in southwest Calgary, transported them to his farm and murdered them there.
Their bodies have never been found.
Parhar said the terrain she followed Garland through was “awful” and she risked breaking an ankle if she attempted to run.
Before HAWCS arrived, “it was pitch black, you couldn’t see anything,” she said.
“I didn’t know how close we were to Mr. Garland,” she told Faulkner.
Const. Lane Trim, who was in the HAWCS helicopter as Garland was tracked through the field near his farm, took the infrared video of his arrest.
Trim said he decided to get HAWCS airborne when he heard officers were moving in on Garland.
“The target (of police surveillance) was out on foot and approaching the Garland residence,” Trim said, of his decision to get HAWCS off the ground.
He said he was already familiar with the area because HAWCS had been involved in several searches of the 16-hectare farm Garland shared with his elderly parents, when police were looking for the victims.
Using an infrared camera and a powerful 30-million candlepower “night sun” spotlight, Trim was able to capture Garland as he ran into the row of trees to avoid detection.
At one point on the video, the shadowy figure later identified as the accused, could be seen crawling through the trees.
Parhar was the last Crown witness in the case. Defence counsel Kim Ross said Garland will not be calling evidence in his defence. Jurors will hear final arguments Monday.