WINNIPEG – Candace Derksen died painlessly within 24 hours of the time she entered the brickyard shed where her body was found 26 years ago, Manitoba’s former chief medical examiner testified Friday.
"She lost consciousness pretty fast, but it may have taken hours before she died," Dr. Peter Markesteyn said at the trial of Mark Edward Grant.
Grant, now 47, is charged with first-degree murder for allegedly abducting the 13-year-old girl on her way home from school Nov. 30, 1984., and leaving her bound hand to foot in the shed where she froze to death.
Markesteyn said in such cases the organs in the human body cease to function and eventually the heart stops, but long before that happens victims lose consciousness.
"There is no pain sensation whatsoever."
Manitoba’s chief medical examiner from 1982 to 1999, Markesteyn said he performed perhaps 10,000 autopsies during his career. After he retired he worked for the United Nations and travelled to the former Yugoslavia to investigate war crimes.
He said he found no major injuries on Derksen’s body and no signs she had been sexually assaulted.
"This child was otherwise healthy … I certified the death as a result of hypothermia as a result of exposure."
Derksen was wearing a light jacket and jeans when she left home that day in 1984, but overnight the temperature plunged to -25 C.
"She wasn’t dressed for that kind of weather," her mother Wilma Derksen recalled outside court after the morning hearing.
With her husband Cliff and other family members, Derksen is sitting through the trial just as she did through the preliminary hearing after which Grant was committed to stand trial.
The trial is expected to take about six weeks and much of the Crown’s case will focus on DNA evidence.
Saul Simmonds, Grant’s lawyer, continued Friday to lay the foundation he needs to question the quality of that evidence.
He started Friday morning with his cross-examination of retired police inspector Robert Parker, who was a constable and part of the identification unit in 1985 and present during the autopsy after the teen’s frozen body was found.
Parker agreed with Simmonds that there were eight people present at the autopsy and most did not wear gloves, gowns or masks – potentially contaminating any DNA recovered from the body and clothing.
DNA was not an issue during investigations in 1985. Grant was only arrested after a cold-case squad took a look at the crime and the remaining evidence in 2006 and 2007.
Wilma Derksen said she had long given up hope that anyone would ever stand trial for her daughter’s death.
Markesteyn said he wore gloves but was not wearing a mask during the autopsy and the kind of precautions that would be taken today were not taken then.
"It was not considered important at that time."
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