Winnipeg serial killer guilty of murdering 4 women in case underscoring 'grim reality' of MMIWG
Jubilation as Jeremy Skibicki convicted in case that galvanized calls to search landfill for women's remains
WARNING: This story contains distressing details.
People pumped their fists in the air and a Winnipeg courtroom erupted into cheers as a judge convicted a serial killer who targeted Indigenous women of first-degree murder, in a case that sought justice for four women but reverberated far beyond that.
Jeremy Skibicki sat staring straight ahead as Court of King's Bench Chief Justice Glenn Joyal delivered his judgment Thursday morning, though no sign of emotion appeared on Skibicki's face as he learned his fate.
The decision, finding Skibicki guilty on all four counts of first-degree murder he faced, came after a trial that heard weeks of evidence in a high-profile case that galvanized people across the country to push for the search of a Winnipeg-area landfill for the remains of two of the women Skibicki killed.
Joyal said while reading a summary of his decision that it would be "artificial and disingenuous" to ignore the fact that for many, the case is "emblematic of much of what is associated with the tragedies that underlie the very grim reality of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls [MMIWG] in Canada."
Skibicki, 37, was convicted in the killings of three First Nations women — Morgan Harris, 39, Marcedes Myran, 26, and Rebecca Contois, 24 — as well as an unidentified woman who has been given the name Mashkode Bizhiki'ikwe, or Buffalo Woman, by community leaders. Police have said they believe she was Indigenous and in her 20s.
Contois was a member of O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation, also known as Crane River. Harris and Myran were both members of Long Plain First Nation. All four women were killed in Winnipeg between mid-March and mid-May of 2022.
Skibicki targeted vulnerable Indigenous women who frequented Winnipeg homeless shelters, bringing each of the four women back to his North Kildonan apartment, where he sexually assaulted or forcibly confined them before strangling or drowning them in his bathtub.
The convicted killer, who argued during his trial that he should be found not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder, now faces an automatic life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.
Melissa Robinson, a cousin of Harris, said the court process has been a long road of heartache and grief for her family. But with Thursday's decision, she felt relief — along with a sense that the way Indigenous women are seen is changing and that courts will not allow people who harm them to go unpunished.
"It's a good day," Robinson said from Montreal, where a resolution was passed this week at the Assembly of First Nations general assembly to push for an inquiry into the police and government responses to the case involving her cousin.
"It's a damn effin' good day to be Indigenous today."
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The massive Winnipeg courtroom, which was smudged before the proceedings began, was packed to capacity Thursday morning for the highly anticipated decision. Family members, supporters and members of the public filled the nearly 100 seats in the gallery, with more people standing to the side and others waiting in the hall. Winnipeg police members and court staff were moved out of the gallery and into empty jury seats to make room for more family and supporters.
After the ruling, the celebration spilled out onto the sidewalk outside the courthouse, where a sacred fire burned, people sang and drummed, and passing vehicles honked their horns.
Hours later, a round dance happened at the iconic intersection of Winnipeg's Portage Avenue and Main Street.
'Unspeakable' acts
The "mercilessly graphic" facts of the case, which Justice Joyal called "at once jarring and numbing," also included that Skibicki performed sex acts on the women's bodies after killing them, and that he dismembered some before disposing of their remains in garbage bins near his apartment. He also kept some of the women's belongings after killing them, Joyal said, noting the "cruelty and barbarism" of the killings.
But he said however "unspeakable" those acts — and however "acute" the pain tied to missing and murdered Indigenous women — his decision was based only on the law and the evidence presented at trial, held over a period of several weeks in May and June.
That process included giving full consideration to the defence argument that when the killings happened, Skibicki was driven by delusions that left him unable to realize what he was doing was morally wrong.
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Joyal said the defence team didn't prove Skibicki was not criminally responsible on any of the four counts, while prosecutors proved he had the state of mind needed to be found guilty of first-degree murder, noting the sexual assaults and unlawful confinement committed against the women.
While Contois's partial remains were discovered in garbage bins near Skibicki's apartment and at Winnipeg's Brady Road landfill, the remains of Harris and Myran are believed to be buried at the Prairie Green landfill, just outside the city.
A search of that site, which was initially deemed unfeasible by police and later became a political issue in Manitoba's last provincial election, is scheduled to begin later this year.
Family members of Harris and Myran said outside court Thursday that while they got justice for their loved ones, their focus is now on what could be the difficult process of recovering the women's remains.
Donna Bartlett, Marcedes Myran's grandmother, waved a fist as she spoke outside the courthouse.
"I was worried but I'm happy now. It's been hard, but it's good," she said. "He got convicted of murder and I'm glad of that, I really am. Now the next step is [to] bring my girl home — even just a piece of her would be good."
It's still unknown where Mashkode Bizhiki'ikwe's remains are. The judge noted the "powerful and moving" remembrance of people who came to honour the unidentified woman, in a courtroom where a buffalo headdress sat on the counsel table in front of prosecutors throughout the proceedings.
Defence expert given little weight
Though Skibicki is believed to have killed the first of the four women in March 2022, the investigation into the case didn't begin until two months later, after someone looking through dumpsters for items to salvage made the "gruesome discovery" of Contois's partial remains in a shopping bag.
Police soon identified Skibicki as a suspect and brought him in for questioning in Contois's death, during which he surprised the officers interviewing him by suddenly admitting to the racially motivated killings of all four women, and performing sex acts on their bodies before disposing of their remains.
With that videotaped confession admitted as evidence, the trial became not about proving whether Skibicki committed the killings, but about his motivations.
Joyal rejected the defence's not criminally responsible argument and said he afforded little weight to the evidence of Dr. Sohom Das, a forensic psychiatrist from the United Kingdom who assessed Skibicki after the killings.
Das, testifying for the defence, said he believed Skibicki was driven by delusions linked to schizophrenia and heard voices that made him believe he was on a mission from God, preventing him from realizing his actions were morally wrong.
Joyal expressed concern about Das's professionalism but found the evidence of Dr. Gary Chaimowitz, a forensic psychiatrist who testified for the prosecution, to be reliable and credible. Chaimowitz testified he believed Skibicki made up his delusions and was motivated by racism and homicidal necrophilia, or arousal to having sex with people he killed.
Joyal noted the trial had an "undeniable and profound" impact on Indigenous and non-Indigenous people across Manitoba, which was visible in the courtroom in the "pain and suffering of the victims' families and friends, who so diligently attended the trial each day," despite hearing "excruciating and horrific details" of their loved ones' last moments.
WATCH | Verdict 'won't bring her back,' says brother of Rebecca Contois:
Though many likely attended the trial to get answers about why the four women were killed, Joyal said the "perhaps unsatisfying reality" of criminal trials is that they're usually an "inadequate and ill-equipped form for answering the more difficult and deeper questions that will always surround the pathologies, inhumanity and barbarism of an accused like Jeremy Skibicki."
That's the case for Jeremy Contois, Rebecca Contois's older brother, who said while he was relieved to hear the decision, he was left with one question.
"Just why. Why did he have to do it?"
Joyal said his statements on Thursday represented a summary of the full decision. The complete written judgment will be over 150 pages long and released next week, while the victims' family members will be invited to read impact statements at a later sentencing. That date has not been set.
Skibicki's lawyer Leonard Tailleur said he plans to make a decision about whether to appeal the ruling after reading the judge's full written reasons.
Support is available for anyone affected by these reports and the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous people. Immediate emotional assistance and crisis support are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week through a national hotline at 1-844-413-6649.
You can also access, through the government of Canada, health support services such as mental health counselling, community-based support and cultural services, and some travel costs to see elders and traditional healers. Family members seeking information about a missing or murdered loved one can access Family Information Liaison Units.
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With files from Karen Pauls and Josh Crabb