Murder at McDonald's (46 page)

Brian Williston began his final remarks after the lunch break. Unlike his opponent, he had the benefit of knowing that most of the people in the room were silently cheering him on. Most, but not all: Freeman MacNeil's mother and sister sat at the side of the courtroom, farthest from the victims' relatives. The MacNeils had attended the entire trial, and now they listened quietly as Brian Williston told the jury what he believed was the impulse that led to the murders—“the thirst for money.” The prosecutor went on to explore the reason for Neil Burroughs's murder, emphasizing that the blow with shovel handle was a major contributing factor in his death. “Why did he hit Neil Burroughs with the shovel handle? To assist his partners in ending the life of this man who was alive and could identify him. He was already shot and cut—then struck with the stick. This blow contributed by keeping him down and less able to resist his attackers.” Williston told the jury that Freeman MacNeil killed, and watched his friends kill, but it did not play on his conscience. “Don't let him fool you. You will know the truth.”

The summation took just under an hour. Afterwards, Justice Gruchey told the jurors to return the following morning—with overnight bags, in case they found themselves deliberating for more than one day. As Justice Gordon Tiddman had done in the Wood trial, Justice Gruchey began his charge the next morning by asking the jury to put aside the natural emotions stemming from this brutal crime, and to disregard the public outcry that had followed the murders. In order to find MacNeil guilty of the first-degree murder of Burroughs, he said, they would probably have to accept that the murder had occurred during the unlawful confinement of Donna Warren, and that MacNeil was a party to that confinement. And to find him guilty of the first-degree murder of James Fagan, they would have to find that the unlawful confinement was part of one continuous criminal activity—although Donna was already dead when MacNeil shot Fagan—or that MacNeil deliberately planned to kill Fagan to eliminate him as a witness.

While the jury was sequestered, the relatives gathered in groups and talked about the case—and anything else they could think of to keep their minds off the slowly ticking clock. For Julia Burroughs, spending time in Halifax for the trial meant she had to be away from her son; she missed Justin a great deal, and knew from talking to him on the phone that he was more than anxious for his mom to return. But there would be no verdict that day. The jurors were taken to a hotel, and the relatives left.

Ken Haley would not be back to hear this final verdict in the McDonald's case. Early the following morning, before deliberations resumed, Haley received a call from home. His father had succumbed after his long battle with cancer—perhaps, his son thought, he waited until the prosecutors had finished their work and the case was in the hands of the jury.

By about five o'clock that evening, it seemed a verdict was forthcoming. The jury asked for a little more time when the judge offered to send them back to the hotel for the night, but half an hour later they sent out a note, saying they had better sleep on it again. On the morning of October 8, the large public foyer outside the courtroom once again filled with reporters, camera operators, police officers, sheriff's deputies, and the anxious relatives of the McDonald's victims. This time, Brian Williston joined those gathered in the common area; he too was beginning to wonder what was keeping the jury. At one point, Germaine MacNeil went into the room where Freeman MacNeil's mother sat waiting with her daughter, and asked the other Mrs. MacNeil to come and see her daughter—to see what “they” had done to Arlene. Germaine was red-faced and crying, and sheriff's deputies avoided a confrontation by quickly asking her to leave the area. It was an awkward moment for those waiting in the hall; both women were clearly victims of this crime. Throughout the trial, Freeman MacNeil's mother avoided all contact with the media, the police, and others gathered outside Courtroom Three. She remained secluded in the small witness room set aside for her, and as she entered and left the courtroom, her head was always low. She would not show the anguish she must have felt. Freeman was her baby, and although he was still alive, there was no question she was losing him. He would not be coming back home.

Finally, at about 11:00 a.m., the jury sent its notice to the judge: the verdicts were ready. While intense security had become part of the routine of the trial, it somehow seemed particularly obtrusive to the victims' relatives this time. When Jimmy Fagan's brothers were asked to remove their cowboy boots so they could be searched for weapons, they joked about the process, but inside they felt humiliated. Neil Burroughs's father looked angry but remained silent as a contingent of security officers escorted Freeman MacNeil's relatives to their seats. All he could think about was that
those
people were not being harassed, but he and his family were. Inside the courtoom, the tension increased when the relatives saw that a large, heavy court table had been placed across the gate between the public area and the main court, and that the prisoner's chair had been moved several metres beyond the waist-high bar that divided the room. As well, there were twenty-five officers crowded into the court, most seated between the public gallery and the area occupied by the judge, jury, lawyers, and accused, and there were a few RCMP officers stationed at the back of the room.

Before asking the jury to come in, Justice Gruchey urged the victims' families to maintain the composure they'd shown throughout the difficult trial. “Please, when the verdict is brought in, I ask that you maintain that dignity. Any demonstrations now—any untoward action—will reflect badly on the excellent names and reputations you clearly deserve.” Once again, anxiety and stress built as the relatives waited to hear what a jury of strangers had to say about one of the men responsible for taking their loved ones away. Neil Burroughs, Sr., continued to fume at the spectacle of the intense security measures court officials felt were needed to protect Freeman MacNeil. Why was MacNeil being protected, while he and his family were made to feel like criminals? The jury foreman began to read the verdicts, but unlike Justice Tiddman, who had detailed each charge against Derek Wood before asking for the verdicts, Justice Gruchey simply listed the counts by number, and the jurors responded with verdicts: count one, guilty as charged; count two, guilty as charged; count three, guilty of second-degree murder; count four, guilty as charged. There was confusion in the courtroom, and the victims' relatives questioned each other frantically as they tried to determine what each count meant. The second-degree verdict had to be either for Jimmy's or Neil's murder, but for a few agonized moments no-one was sure which was which. Finally, all became clear: the jury had found MacNeil guilty of the first-degree murder of Neil Burroughs; Jimmy Fagan's killing was a case of second-degree murder. In addition, MacNeil was also found guilty of the robbery and the unlawful confinement. The verdicts made it clear that the jury had not accepted the evidence of Dr. Bradford; had they agreed that MacNeil was suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome and had a diminished mental capacity, the verdicts would have been manslaughter, not murder. Apparently, the jurors concluded that the blow to Neil Burroughs did contribute to his death, which occurred while MacNeil was participating in the unlawful confinement of Donna Warren. But the jurors clearly had decided that the confinement ended with Donna's death, and thus could not be connected to the shooting of Jimmy Fagan. They believed that MacNeil killed Fagan, but not that he planned the murder; they must have decided that the shooting was a spontaneous act.

Cathy Fagan could not believe it. She began to rock in her seat and cry. Her sobs grew louder, and the others soon wept with her. Justice Gruchey quickly sentenced MacNeil to the mandatory life term with no parole for twenty-five years on the first-degree conviction, and asked the jury to consider an appropriate parole eligibility on the second-degree conviction. Juries are not required to make such a recommendation, but judges must give them that opportunity. The jurors retired to consider the issue, and Freeman MacNeil was just being escorted out of the courtroom when a flashfire of emotion and pain burst through the courtroom. MacNeil went pale as he was hustled away, and Justice Gruchey also left quickly. But the prosecutors and defence lawyers remained to witness what they later called a very painful expression of grief.

Sixteen

Cathy Fagan ignited the explosive build-up of tension in Courtroom Three, crying out to her brothers as Freeman MacNeil was being led from the room: “Go get him! Paul, David, go get him!” Her knees buckled as she tried to push her brothers towards the wall of security officers protecting MacNeil. Paul and David Fagan had no intention of moving in that direction; instead, they turned to help Cathy. But their anger burst through the surface as deputies roughly escorted Cathy from the courtroom. “Get your hands off her, you hear me? Don't you hurt her!” they shouted. They rushed towards the back of the room as the rear doors flew open, and the sheriff's deputies and a hysterical Cathy Fagan stumbled into the anteroom beside the courtroom. The noise attracted the attention of the camera crews outside, who began recording as Cathy struggled with the guards, screaming that she didn't want to be filmed. Her brothers tried to chase the journalists away, even pushing a guard in their direction, but that only made for more drama, and the scrum of camera operators and photographers moved in closer.

Back in the courtroom, Joey Burroughs screamed at Kevin Coady, who remained in his seat with his back to Burroughs, a hollow feeling in his heart as he listened. “You fuckin' scumbag, you don't have a heart!” howled the enraged young man. “He fuckin' murders people! Coady, you'll fry in fuckin' hell!” An angry and tearful Julia Burroughs sat on the bench she had occupied for weeks. She turned sideways and pulled her knees up, hugging them and crying, “We had no protection!” Meanwhile, her mother-in-law marched to the front of the room and began to berate Freeman MacNeil's mother: “I hope you don't get one minute of sleep, lady. We don't get a night of sleep after what they done to our kids.” Edith MacNeil made no response, just kept her head down and stared at her hands, clasped tightly in her lap. Her mind filled with the jury foreman's words: “Guilty … guilty … guilty … guilty.” Her son, guilty of the most serious offences in the Canadian criminal justice system. Any hope she might have had that Kevin Coady could somehow persuade the jury to go easy on Freeman had evaporated. Edith MacNeil seemed lost in a world of her own, oblivious to the turmoil going on around her. Mrs. MacNeil's friends would later say that she had changed completely—that anguish had aged her. Once a lively, friendly woman, she had become quiet and sullen, and at times, during the trial, she looked almost like a frightened deer, frozen in the headlights of an oncoming car.

Theresa Fagan, who had remained silent for a year and a half, could not believe what was happening around her. She had done what the lawyers wanted; she had kept quiet, and her kids had stayed away from the reporters. But now, all she could think was that the verdict meant Jimmy's death wasn't as important as the others. “Jimmy never hurt a person!” she shouted to no-one in particular. “He never said a cross word to anyone!” I watched, listened, and wrote as much as I could in the pandemonium. Those relatives who weren't yelling were crying and comforting one another, or just sitting there, looking pale and confused. It wasn't supposed to end like this, I thought. Two veteran newspaper reporters stood near me, and I could see they had tears in their eyes; no-one was immune to the raw emotion being displayed around us.

Neil Burroughs's brother Joey vents his frustration with the tight security system for Freeman MacNeil's trial in Halifax. [Print from ATV video tape.]

As the crowd began to move out to the foyer, ATV cameraman Stuart McDougal and I followed. Outside, I grabbed a microphone and tried to record the emotions of those leaving; Stuart, his energy heightened by all the emotion, was right with me. “Joey, what can you say?” It was a stupid question, but I knew that Joey Burroughs had a lot to express and wanted the chance to speak out. Other camera crews rushed over as Joey, still running on emotion and adrenaline, began to shout into the microphone and condemn what he saw as a justice system that protected the guilty and made criminals out of victims. “Look at this! I never seen nothing fuckin' like it. A fuckin' travesty of justice! This isn't gonna end here, you hear me?” Everyone heard, but no-one responded. His shouts were loud enough to be heard in the courtroom, and security officers came out to restore order in the hall. Joey stepped away from the cameras and hollered at the men, aiming his hurt and anger at them: “Come on boys, right fuckin' now! You'll earn your fuckin' pay today, ya bastards! This fuckin' justice system sucks!” The guards kept their distance and let him blow off steam; they weren't looking for a physical confrontation.