Cop’s killer caused ‘lifetime of damage’
Russell’s widow recalls ‘awesome guy’ in emotional victim impact statement
Finally, after two years, the widow of a Toronto police sergeant killed by a psychotic snowplow thief said her piece.
Christine Russell told the Ontario board that oversees mentally ill offenders that Richard Kachkar caused her family “a lifetime of damage.”
In a half-hour victim impact statement, Russell described the painful journey that started on Jan. 12, 2011, when she first heard on the radio that an officer had been struck by a snowplow.
“Never once did I suspect that the officer was Ryan,” she told the five-member Ontario Review Board hearing panel.
She pointed to a large picture of her smiling husband, Sgt. Ryan Russell, and recalled being physically restrained from touching his disfigured body at the hospital. “I could not kiss him goodbye. This absolutely broke me.”
The rush of events accompanying her grief — the media attention, her single parenthood, Kachkar’s preliminary hearing and trial — were overwhelming, leaving her depressed and stressed.
Her husband was more than a fine police officer to whom 12,000 paid tribute at his funeral, she said. “He was an awesome guy with a huge heart.” Telling their only child, Nolan, then 2, his dad was dead was excruciatingly difficult, she said. “Richard Kachkar stole a father from an innocent child.” Sitting on the other side of the courtroom, Kachkar gazed blankly ahead, never looking at Russell, her parents, Karen and Roy Hylkema, or Glenn Russell, the officer’s father, as they delivered their emotional statements. Nor did he look at Ryan Russell’s colleague, Sgt. Dan Sova, who described Russell as a well-liked, rising star at downtown’s 52 Division, “the Sidney Crosby of policing.” Looking at Kachkar, he said, “You took away so much, Richard, a void that can never be filled. I promise we will do our best to forget you, guy, guaranteed.” Kachkar’s lawyer, Bob Richardson, has said his client is deeply remorseful. Last month, a jury found Kachkar, 46, not criminally responsible by way of mental illness for Russell’s death. He had been charged with first-degree murder. The Crown announced Friday it will not appeal the verdict. Richardson and Crown Attorney Michael Feindel jointly recommended to the panel that Kachkar be held at Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences in Whitby.
He would stay in a medium-security unit and be given escorted day passes on the hospital grounds.
The board will release its decision next week, said hearing chair William Donaldson.
Dr. Philip Klassen, a top forensic psychiatrist at the hospital, told the hearing he recommends Kachkar be given anti-psychotic medication on a trial basis.
“The first thing you do at all times is you protect the public,” he said.
Kachkar ran barefoot from the Good Shepherd homeless shelter on Queen St. E. and stole an idling snowplow parked in front of a Regent Park Tim Hortons shortly after 5 a.m.
He took it on a two-hour rampage, hitting cars and injuring drivers, fatally clipping the popular officer who was trying to stop him.