TORONTO – Dellen Millard, the well-educated CEO of an airline services company and the son of a successful businessman, has been charged with first-degree murder in connection with the death of Tim Bosma.
Bosma disappeared from his Ancaster home Monday as he was showing his truck to two apparently interested men.
Police allege Millard was one of those men and are investigating a field he owned in Ayr, Ontario where his real estate agent said Millard was planning to live with his one-time fiancée.
Millard, 27, is the CEO of his family business – MillardAir Ltd. – which was founded in 1963 by his grandfather, Carl Millard, and then operated by Dellen’s father, Wayne, until his death in Dec, 2012.
The company was originally an airline, but has since become an airline services company, specializing in airplane maintenance.
It appears the legendary aviation services business recently fell on hard times: In a March 23 post on a blog for the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association in Ottawa, a man writing under the name Robert Kozlowski was looking for renters.
“I’m trying to get the word out about the availability of our hangar at Kitchener/Waterloo Airport,” he wrote. “You might know the history behind the Millard family and how they have contributed to Canadian aviation.”
Kozlowski added that just as the company’s latest venture was getting started, “the president Wayne Millard passed away and the family decided to shut down the MRO.
“That has left the family with a very large hangar and we are looking for tenants.”
The contact information identified Kozlowski as vice-president of operations for MillardAir, and is identical to that on the MillardAir website.
According to Skies Magazine, MillardAir owned three hangars at the Waterloo International Airport.
Hamilton Police are investigating at least one hangar at the airport in connection with Bosma’s disappearance.
But his lawyer, Deepak Paradkar, maintains his client is “100 per cent not guilty.”
Paradkar says Millard comes from a “fine family” and has no previous criminal record.
Millard attended the Toronto French School and according to a relative – who did not want to be identified –Millard may have been influenced by other people.
The relative of Millard’s said they e-mailed occasionally and had a good relationship but were not an extremely close family.
According to documents obtained by Global News, Millard owned a million-dollar home in Etobicoke, which he purchased from his father, and a large plot of land in Ayr.
The Ayr property is being investigated by police in connection to the disappearance of Bosma.
The former owner of the land – who did not want to be identified – told Global News that the area holds a special place in her heart.
“We were there daily for many of those years. That was a special spot for us to go to the farm for picnics and to take walks through the bush areas,” she said. “We’re sorry that it’s come to this kind of recognition of this property.”
Bruce Nicholson, a Kitchener-area real estate agent who brokered the deal, said he was told Millard was planning on using the land to build a family home with a woman identified to Nicholson as Millard’s fiancée.
VIDEO: Police investigate Dellen Millard’s land near Ayr, Ontario.
Documents show that Millard paid $835,000 for the land in 2011.
The piece of land is located on Roseville Road in Ayr, Ontario and backs up onto Highway 401. Nicholson described the land as unusual, hilly farmland. He added that the land closest to the highway was mostly bush.
There was a barn close to the road, Nicholson said, adding that Millard was likely going to build a driveway around the barn that would lead to the top of a hill where his home would eventually be built.
But no home was ever constructed.
He met with Dellen and his father a number of times, including a walk through the farmland during the negotiation process.
“At the time he seemed like a nice enough young man, was reasonably good to do business with, very business-like in his approach to buying property,” Nicholson said.
On Friday, police arrested Millard “without incident” while driving on Cawthra Road in Mississauga.
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