The fourth person charged in the 2008 targeted slayings of Mission, B.C. couple Lisa Dudley and Guthrie McKay received a 10-year sentence Friday morning.
Thomas Robert Holden was charged with two counts of first-degree murder and in September 2016, he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit murder.
McKay’s parents, Pat and Dorothy, were disappointed with the sentence saying “nobody has won today.”
“I think a sentence that would have been a bit longer would have been better. You don’t feel cheated. I don’t think justice has been served and it doesn’t look like it’s been served. when someone that does the killing gets three times more time than the guy who ordered it and paid for it. It doesn’t feel right.”
In a 2013 statement the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team said they believed that Tom Holden “played a significant role and worked closely with the co-accused to plan and commit the murder of Lisa Dudley and Guthrie McKay.”
ARCHIVE VIDEO: Global News reporter Rumina Daya has details from the investigation from 2012.
Dudley, 37, and McKay, 33, were shot in their home, and neighbours who heard gunshots called police. A Mountie sent to investigate did not get out of his cruiser so didn’t see McKay dead and Dudley lying critically injured in the house, where she survived for several days before a neighbour found her, although she died en route to hospital.
Another man involved in the targeted murders, Bruce Main, was charged with two counts of first-degree murder in 2011. He was sentenced to eight years in jail in 2013.
Dudley and McKay were running a marijuana grow-op in their home. Main helped out Dudley at the grow-op and was the one who led the killers to the home.
On May 13, 2011 Jack Douglas Woodruff was also charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the case. Ten months after he was charged he plead guilty to both counts and is currently serving a life sentence. Another man involved, Justin Andrew Mackinnon, was also charged with two counts of first-degree murder in 2011 and was sentenced to seven years in jail.
ARCHIVE VIDEO: The second of three men charged in the double murder of Lisa Dudley and Guthrie McKay in Mission five-years ago entered a guilty plea in court today. Julia Foy reports.
In 2013, Dudley’s mother, Rosemarie Surakka, claimed the RCMP failed to properly investigate a shooting that led to her daughter’s death. Surakka filed a lawsuit against the RCMP with the court eventually ruling she had the right to sue the force.
One of the RCMP officers involved in the case was docked a day’s pay and received a letter of reprimand.
The case led to a lawsuit and procedural changes in the way the RCMP investigates 911 calls. After the shooting, RCMP policy was changed to require officers to speak directly to the person who makes a 911 call about shots being fired.
~ with files from Canadian Press and Yuliya Talmazan
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