Crown faces challenges in murder cases without bodies: Fox

Prosecuting a murder case without the body of the victim isn’t unheard of, but it comes with inherent difficulties.

During a conversation with 980 CJME’s John Gormley on Wednesday, Regina-based defence lawyer Aaron Fox said the absence of a body means the lack of forensic evidence that the body can provide for the Crown prosecutor.

“If there are wounds, (the body can show) how they were inflicted, what sort of device was used to inflict the wounds, whether it’s gunshot or a knife or something like that,” Fox said. “And if you can tie that to a weapon that was in possession of the accused person at some point in time, you would have the benefit of that.”

On Tuesday, Greg Fertuck was charged with first-degree murder in connection with the disappearance of his estranged wife, Sheree Fertuck. Her body hasn’t been found.

She last was seen Dec. 7, 2015, when she left her family farm near Kenaston in a gravel truck. The truck was found abandoned at a nearby gravel pit, with Fertuck’s keys, jacket and cellphone inside.

Greg Fertuck made his first court appearance Wednesday in Saskatoon.

Fox said that, in many instances involving first-degree murder charges, the accused attempts to get rid of the victim’s body. If that happens, the police and the Crown need to rely on two types of evidence to advance their case.

“One would be admissions made by the accused to the police or more often than not to third parties, family members or friends — or maybe (the persons charged have) a few drinks and make some admissions,” Fox said. “The second is circumstantial evidence.

“The most significant piece of evidence that we now see in that area is DNA evidence. That has obviously developed over the last 20 years and that has really changed the ability of the police to investigate and determine who might be charged with an offence when there is no body.”

Fox said the Crown often can show that the victim was last seen with the accused or the victim’s DNA may be found in the suspect’s vehicle or home.

That, he said, is the kind of circumstantial evidence that the Crown can assemble in a case when the victim’s body hasn’t been found.

“We always sort of think (circumstantial evidence) is maybe not very strong, but circumstantial evidence often is extremely persuasive,” Fox said.

“If you package up enough of it, you get to the point where you’re basically saying, ‘There’s really no other conclusion we could come to but that the accused caused the individual’s death.’ That’s the type of evidence that the Crown I’m sure would be looking for in a case like this.”

The RCMP has been building its case against Greg Fertuck over the past 3 1/2 years and Fox suggested the police investigation likely is still ongoing even after an arrest was made.

He noted that cases based on circumstantial evidence usually take some time to assemble as the Crown connects several pieces of evidence.

If that’s the situation in the Fertuck case, Fox said he wouldn’t expect a preliminary hearing to start until a year from now. A trial then would start a year after that.

“Although everybody works on timelines shorter than that and tries to make them shorter than that, the reality is (that) because of the complicated nature of a circumstantial-evidence murder case, it just takes a while to put it together,” Fox said.