Justice served, once and for all
The following is the Hamilton Spectator report by Susan Clairmont on the murder conviction of Robert Badgerow on Dec. 1, 2016. It was the fourth time he stood trial for the rape and murder of Diane Werendowicz 35 years before.
Diane’s rapist and killer has been convicted.
Again.
Canada’s most tumultuous murder prosecution has finally ended with a jury finding Robert Badgerow guilty of the first-degree murder of Diane Werendowicz.
It has taken 35 years, four trials, two convictions, two hung juries and appeals all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada to get to this point, but when Badgerow was cuffed and led out of the courtroom Thursday night, it seemed for all involved that this was finally the end.
Badgerow is the first person in Canada to stand trial four times for the same first-degree murder. And though he will likely appeal this conviction, it seems unlikely at this point in the long saga that there could be any legal error or new evidence to merit another trial.
“I’m so relieved that justice has been served,” said Karl Werendowicz, Diane’s nephew, just moments after the verdict was rendered at 6:14 p.m. He was struggling to control his emotions, as was his mother, Lorraine, who is married to Diane’s older brother, Steven. “Now we’re going to go home and start the healing process.”
Karl phoned his dad the moment he left the courtroom. Steven suffered a severe brain injury during a car accident and was unable to attend the last three trials.
“Let this bring hope to other women who have been victims of rape,” Lorraine said. “There can be justice.”
Badgerow does not think so. As the jury foreman read out the verdict, Badgerow — in the prisoner’s box for the first time since his trial began on Sept. 19 — bowed his head and grimaced.
A moment later, when Justice Patrick Flynn asked the 58-yearold father of three grown boys if he’d like to speak, Badgerow stood.
“From the onset, I said I was not guilty. I still maintain I am not guilty … The only people I hurt were the women in my life … My marriages … All they wanted to do was love me … I’ll always maintain my innocence … I’m innocent. I did not do this.”
Diane was a beautiful, promising young woman, days away from her 24th birthday, who just wanted to walk home. She had worked a long shift on June 19, 1981, as a nursing assistant in the geriatric ward of McMaster University hospital. Girlfriends talked her into going out for drinks, but she left early, saying she was going home.
She never made it. She was raped, drowned and strangled in a Stoney Creek ravine.
Her case went cold for 17 years until police reopened it and realized another woman, Debbie Robertson, had been attacked and stabbed through the ear with a screwdriver just weeks after Diane’s murder and only blocks away from where she was found.
Debbie said she knew the man who nearly killed her. She went to school with him. His name was Robert Badgerow.
Linking those attacks, Hamilton police got cast-off DNA from Badgerow, a Dofasco steelworker, in 1998 and discovered it was his semen inside Diane.
He was charged with her first-degree murder and Debbie’s attempted murder.
Badgerow has always said he had anonymous, consensual sex with Diane in his car in the bar parking lot and that when she left him, somebody else killed her on her walk home.
A jury convicted him at his firstmurder trial, but it was overturned on appeal.
Then he went on trial for the attack on Debbie. That judge stayed the charge after a few days of testimony, saying it was impossible for Badgerow to get a fair trial because key witnesses had died and some evidence was missing.
Nobody has ever been convicted in her case.
A first-degree murder conviction comes with an automatic sentence of life in prison with no parole eligibility for 25 years. Badgerow has already served 11 years, which will be credited toward his parole eligibility.
The six women and six men of the jury, who began deliberating late Monday morning met privately with the judge after leaving court. A 13th juror, who was dismissed just before deliberations began, was in the courtroom for the verdict. She said she needed to witness how it would all end.
The jurors were never told that Badgerow had once been on trial for trying to kill another woman.
Though Badgerow has been surrounded by family awaiting the verdict this week, few were with him in the courtroom when the moment actually came.
The most heartbreaking reaction came from his eldest son, Derek, 25. He doubled over, placed his head in his hands and wept loudly.
Badgerow appealed, but that failed on May 9, 2019.