A Saskatoon jury has found Roderick Sutherland guilty on all three charges laid against him, marking a significant moment in the five-year investigation into the death of Megan Gallagher.
After roughly 13.5 hours of deliberation over two days, the jury returned its verdict late Friday afternoon at Saskatoon’s Court of King’s Bench.
Sutherland, 42, was found guilty of manslaughter, unlawful confinement, and offering an indignity to human remains in connection with Gallagher’s 2020 death.
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Gallagher, a 30-year-old Métis woman and mother, disappeared in September 2020.
According to an agreed statement of facts presented during the trial, she was confined and assaulted in Sutherland’s garage on Weldon Avenue in Saskatoon before her body was placed in a truck and dumped off the St. Louis Bridge into the South Saskatchewan River.
Her remains were discovered more than two years later, on Sept. 29, 2022, on the riverbank near St. Louis, roughly 105 km northeast of Saskatoon.
Family members of Gallagher wept quietly in court as the verdict was read, the culmination of a long and painful legal process.
Sutherland is the ninth and final person arrested in connection with Gallagher’s death, and the last to stand trial.
The jury began deliberating Thursday afternoon around 2 p.m. and broke for the night at 9 p.m., resuming again at 9 a.m. Friday.
A sentencing date has not yet been confirmed.
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