Consecutive or concurrent: for Millard’s victims it matters

Patricide, a father shot through the eye as he slept.

Thrill kill, a stranger murdered when all he did was put his truck up for sale and the diabolical came knocking. A young woman who had been a friend, kind of loved him, but she became a nuisance, a thorn in the side of his girlfriend.

Three people slain. Three separate trials. Three firstdegree murder convictions for Dellen Millard.

The only question now is whether the one-time scion of his family’s aviation business — a spoiled son who had it all and then some — will die in prison for certain or for maybe.

Millard is 33. He’s already serving consecutive life sentences in the homicides of Tim Bosma and Laura Babcock. Half a century behind bars with no parole eligibility.

It is for Justice Maureen Forestell to now decide whether the felon should receive a third consecutive rather than concurrent 25 years for firing a bullet into his father’s brain. Using the gun he purchased while plotting the murder of Babcock, although it’s not known specifically how the life of his former lover was extinguished. Babcock’s body was fed into the flames of an animal incinerator, as was Bosma’s.

Babcock was Millard’s first victim: Killed July 3-4, 2012.

Bosma was Millard’s third victim: Killed May 6, 2013.

Wayne Millard, 71-year-old patriarch — Dellen his only offspring — was shot dead in his home on Nov. 29, 2012, in what was originally ruled a suicide. Until the disappearance of Babcock brought investigators circling back to take a closer look.

At minimum, Millard will not be eligible for parole until 2063. He’d be 77.

If Forestell rules for the prosecution, he’d be ineligible for parole until 2088. He’d be 102.

On Friday, the multi-murderer was given the opportunity to speak. He hadn’t testified at any of his trials but did conduct his own defence in the Babcock case. Ineffectively. Justice Michael Code decided Millard was ineligible for parole for 50 years, tacking on a life term to the Bosma sentence.

Wearing a white shirt and jeans, with the signature tiny braid knotted behind his right ear and a small leather pouch strung on a cord around his neck — its significance never explained, though perhaps an amulet of the Aboriginal faith system he appears to have adopted (not a drop of Aboriginal blood in his veins, so far as is known) — Millard spoke only briefly.

“Just for clarity, I’d like to point out that the facts from my others cases are still under appeal. I don’t think I have anything to add.”

So don’t be looking for remorse or a stricken conscience or, God forbid, an apology to the victims’ families.

Of course, as Millard noted — the only thing he noted — there are appeals afoot. He won’t be copping to anything while the shred of a retrial possibility remains alive. Unlike the victims, who are dead and — well, not buried, two of them. Nothing to bury.

“What does it matter?” asked Crown attorney Jill Cameron, as she began sentencing submissions.

And then she laid out why it matters a great deal, as justice for Wayne Millard, since the law was changed in 2011 allowing for consecutive life sentences, and to sustain public confidence in “a just, peaceful society.”

Another 25 years would reflect “the fact Mr. Millard plotted and planned the murder of three individuals at three points in time for three different reasons. He would have no hope of ever obtaining parole. It’s about justice that Wayne Millard deserves.”

Wayne Millard, Cameron reminded, had built up a new aviation enterprise. “He risked everything to leave a legacy for his only child, who was planning to kill him … As his father lay sleeping, he shot him in the eye, which was a surefire path to death.”

At the trial, which concluded in September with his conviction, court heard that Dellen Millard believed his father had run the business into the ground by piling up debts, including the construction of a new hangar in Waterloo.

“Mr. Millard wanted for nothing. His father had given him everything.”

As Cameron described his father’s qualities, Millard looked at the ceiling and shook his head.

The father had also embarked on a rekindled romance with a woman to whom he’d been engaged when both were in their early 20s. They’d found each other again.

“Any hopes he had for his future were snuffed out by an ungrateful and selfish son,” said Cameron. “Not an ounce of remorse or a shred of gratitude crept into (Dellen’s) mind.’’

The girlfriend, Janet Campbell, was in court to hear her victim impact statement.

“I was his first love and he was mine,” she wrote of Wayne Millard. “We were engaged as young adults. I still have that ring … He was looking forward to the future, as was I — the future of the business and ours. He was looking forward to his tomorrows. “I’m a widow, on my own. My hopes for the future were stolen, as were Wayne’s. I didn’t feel old before this but now I feel old and tired.”

A concurrent life sentence, Cameron argued, would render the murder of Wayne Millard a mere footnote. “Justice for Wayne Millard demands a separate penalty for his murder, otherwise Dellen Millard would have gotten away with it.

“There are times for mercy, there are times an offender has perhaps had a difficult upbringing … But that is not the case here. There is no explanation for his crimes, other than pure entitlement, depravity and evil. A seemingly insatiable appetite to kill people.

“It begs the question: Is there anybody he wouldn’t kill?”

Defence lawyer Ravin Pillay countered that keeping Millard incarcerated with no parole eligibility until 2088 would be “extraordinarily harsh and excessive.”

“He will die before then. Under these circumstances, it means no parole eligibility at all.”

Triple consecutive sentences, asserted Pillay, would “eradicate any incentive to rehabilitate and lead a peaceful life while in custody.”

Which, Pillay added, Millard has been doing as a model prisoner at Toronto East Detention for the five years since he was arrested in the Bosma homicide. (Millard and coaccused Mark Smich were convicted in the Bosma and Babcock murders.)

The lawyer filed letters of support from an official with the John Howard Society and four inmates, saying that he’s become involved in an Aboriginal program, adding that Millard has used his “intelligent mind” to assist other inmates with their cases.

And, gosh, it’s not as if Millard was “as deplorable as a child killer” or preyed on a whole community.

“It would be an error to reach into the facts of the two previous cases. Mr. Millard has already been punished for those two offences.’’

Further: “No evidence has been presented that Mr. Millard is incapable of rehabilitation.”

Everyone is entitled, Pillay said, to the faint hope of freedom some day, even Millard.

Here’s faint commendation: “Aside from three murder convictions, he has no other criminal record.”

Forestell will give her ruling on Dec. 18.