Rafferty ‘upset’ after police interviewed him about Tori’s disappearance

LONDON, Ont. – As the police investigation into the disappearance of eight-year-old Victoria Stafford turned to Michael Rafferty, he was contacting an autowrecker, getting rid of his BlackBerry and complaining that he was being investigated, court heard Tuesday.

Police had their eye on Terri-Lynne McClintic, one of several women Rafferty was dating at the time, almost immediately after Tori vanished outside her Woodstock, Ont., elementary school on April 8, 2009.

Rafferty’s name didn’t come up for several weeks, and when two officers showed up at his house the evening of May 15 to interview him about Tori’s case and ask him about McClintic, he was evidently not pleased.

Joy Woods, one of at least six women Rafferty met through dating website Plenty of Fish and started seeing after April 8, testified Tuesday that Rafferty was “very upset” when he called her on May 16.

“He seemed to feel that the police were blaming him for taking Tori,” Woods said. “I assured him that if he hadn’t there was nothing to worry about…He couldn’t figure out why they would blame him.”

It wasn’t the first time the two had discussed the case, she said. It came up in conversation “quite a bit,” Woods said, including one day when she and Rafferty went to watch her daughter do gymnastics.

Other women Rafferty was dating at the time have previously testified he was obsessed with the case, constantly checking news reports and telling them he had volunteered to help search for the little girl.

The Crown alleges McClintic snatched Tori outside her school at Rafferty’s urging, then he drove the girl more than 100 kilometres north to a secluded farmer’s field where she was sexually assaulted and killed. McClintic is already serving a life sentence after pleading guilty two years ago to first-degree murder.

Rafferty, 31, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, sexual assault causing bodily harm and kidnapping.

His trial, now in its seventh week, heard Tuesday that on May 11 Rafferty made two calls to an autowrecker’s shop in London, Ont., and went there that afternoon. There was no evidence about why Rafferty contacted them or what was discussed.

On May 14 he went to a Bell store to get a new BlackBerry, telling the sales associate that the battery wasn’t lasting very long and he was having trouble with his chargers, court heard. He was given a loaner phone that day. Rafferty told Woods that he was getting a new phone because his old one got wet, but Bell documents show there were no signs of liquid damage to the BlackBerry.

Police were finally able to find Tori’s remains on July 19, 2009, after cellphone records showed there were two calls made from the Mount Forest, Ont., area from Rafferty’s BlackBerry on the evening of April 8.

Investigators were able to retrieve the phone Rafferty got rid of by tracking it back to its manufacturer, Research In Motion, but all the data had been erased, testified provincial police Const. James Brady.

Rafferty returned to the Bell store on May 19 to exchange the loaner phone for a new BlackBerry that was ready, Brady testified. He was also at the mall that night buying clothes for Woods for a trip she had planned to Las Vegas the next day.

“He called me probably about four times that day asking for my shoe size, my dress size, certain things,” Woods testified. “I wasn’t comfortable with it, never was, but he always wanted to buy stuff for me, always wanted to buy clothes for me and wanted to buy the kids stuff.”

Woods agreed to meet Rafferty in the parking lot of a GoodLife Fitness in Woodstock at about 7:30 p.m. so he could give her the new clothes.

Rafferty got into her car, put the shopping bags on the floor, then a man appeared at the car window, asking, “Are you Michael Rafferty?” she said.

Woods got out of the car to see about 20 police officers and watched as Rafferty was put into handcuffs and taken away in a police car.