Case Summary
Casey Armstrong, a 48-year-old Medicine Hat, Alberta man, was found murdered in the bathtub of his trailer home on May 22nd, 2011. He had been stabbed to death.1
Armstrong was last seen on Friday, May 20th, at a local pub. He left at around 11:00 p.m., telling the pub manager, Terry Lynn Russell, that he was going to watch a hockey game. The next day, Russell saw two women, one of whom had “reddish hair”, outside Armstrong’s trailer.2 Russell’s impression was that both women were white. They were placing a garbage or duffle bag into the trunk of a red car.3
On Sunday, a friend of Armstrong’s went to his residence, having tried to contact him several times with no response. He found Armstrong’s body and called 911.4
Initially, the Medicine Hat police investigation met with little success. No DNA samples or fingerprints were retrieved from the scene. Investigators found a bloody footprint but were unable to identify the matching footwear. Police interviewed the former owner of the red Grand-Am that they believed had been outside Armstrong’s home; however, she had sold the car before the murder, to a drug dealer known to her only as “Ginger”. Police were never able to locate the car.5
The police “ran out of leads after eight months investigating the murder.”6 A different officer, Sgt. Brent Secondiak, was then tasked with leading the investigation.7 Sgt. Secondiak reviewed the evidence and honed in on statements made by 29-year-old Wendy Scott, who had been interviewed on December 6-7, 2011. At that time, police had concluded that Scott was not connected to Armstrong’s murder, but Sgt. Secondiak believed that she had lied in her statements.8 At least one confidential source had provided information linking both Scott and Connie Oakes to the killing. An inmate at the Edmonton Institution for Women told police in December 2011 that Oakes, a Cree woman who was also serving a sentence there, had confessed to the crime. The inmate also claimed to have seen Scott and Oakes driving in a red car together.9
Oakes had lived a difficult life. Hailing from Nekaneet First Nation in southern Saskatchewan, she would later recall both “an idyllic childhood picking berries and riding horses,” but “also a darkness shrouding her early years”: in order to escape sexual abuse from an older cousin, she “chose to attend the Lebret Indian residential school,” where she was again abused.10 After leaving school at age 18, she had difficulty securing stable work and struggled with drug addiction. By 2011, Oakes had a lengthy criminal record.11 Early that year, she first met Scott in order to purchase some crack cocaine from her. Oakes later recounted that, surprisingly, Scott gave her the crack for free simply because they had a mutual acquaintance: “She said don’t worry about it, a friend of (the acquaintance) is a friend of hers.”12 In May 2011, Oakes invited Scott to stay in her trailer home after the mutual acquaintance told her that Scott “was homeless and had no place to go.”13
Upon concluding that Scott had lied in her police statements regarding the Armstrong murder, Sgt. Secondiak decided to charge her with obstruction. Scott was arrested on January 10, 2012, and interviewed again.14
Scott, who had a severe intellectual disability, struggled greatly with learning and processing information. She would later be assessed as having an IQ of 50, with verbal comprehension and functional memory scores at the 0.1 and 0.3 percentile rank, respectively. Scott had “an inability to understand and recall complex matters” and would often become confused regarding straightforward subjects.15 She tended to mix up times and events. Scott’s friends knew her as “a kind-hearted girl who would do anything for anybody,” but was “easily used” and “known for lying.”16
In the course of Scott’s several police interviews, officers told her a number of falsehoods: that Oakes had named her as the killer; that Scott’s DNA had been found in Armstrong’s home; and that a surveillance disc showed her involvement, in support of which a “dummy” disc and surveillance report were brought in as interview props.17
At first, Scott named three different people, one of whom was “Ginger”, in connection with Armstrong’s murder. Later, she changed her story, stating that Oakes and Scott had gone to the trailer together, and Oakes had then killed Armstrong while Scott stood by.18 Both women were arrested and charged with first degree murder.19
On November 8, 2012, Scott pled guilty to second degree murder, in exchange for the Crown’s agreement to drop the first degree murder charge against her. A statement of facts supporting her plea was read out to the court. The statement asserted that Scott and Oakes had entered Armstrong’s home, where Oakes had stabbed Armstrong, and that Scott had then helped her to clean up the crime scene. Scott was sentenced to life in prison with no parole eligibility for 10 years—rather than 25, which is what she would have faced if convicted of first degree murder instead.20
Oakes, however, maintained her innocence and stood trial for Armstrong’s murder. Scott, the Crown’s star witness, gave “the only evidence identifying . . . Oakes as the murderer.”21 As Scott’s testimony unfolded, numerous problems emerged. Her account was internally inconsistent, contradicting itself on many occasions. Her story evolved in real time and changed significantly under cross-examination. Moreover, Scott herself stated that she had lied, sometimes under oath, several times.22 Indeed the Crown acknowledged that Scott’s demeanor was “childlike”, but argued that this fact enhanced—rather than undercut—the weight that the jury should place on her evidence.23
On November 15, 2013, the jury found Oakes guilty of second degree murder. She was sentenced to life imprisonment with no chance of parole for 14 years.24
Shortly after Oakes’ conviction—she had not yet had her sentencing hearing—Scott called Kim Pate, then the director of the Elizabeth Fry Society (a support and advocacy organization for incarcerated women), to ask for her help. She told Pate that she did not believe that Oakes had murdered Armstrong. Scott also retained counsel, Deborah Hatch, and swore an affidavit that she had falsely confessed because she was “very scared” and wanted “to be safe.”25 She stated that police had told her she would receive a 25-year prison sentence unless she confessed to the crime.26
In addition, Hatch realized that the statement read out to support Scott’s guilty plea did not disclose a proper basis for her conviction. As Hatch put it, simply “[g]oing along with someone” who (allegedly) committed a homicide “is not being a party to murder.”27 The trial judge had therefore erred in accepting Scott’s guilty plea, since the evidence before the court did not, in fact, establish her guilt.28
Scott appealed her conviction to the Alberta Court of Appeal. The Crown conceded the appeal in light of this serious legal error. On October 16, 2015, the court overturned Scott’s conviction and ordered a new trial.29
In light of these events, Oakes then appealed her conviction as well. She requested that the Alberta Court of Appeal consider the fresh evidence of Scott’s successful appeal, recantation of her false confession, and the manner in which the police had elicited this confession from a woman with significant cognitive difficulties.30
Oakes was denied bail pending appeal. Her application to the Parole Board for compassionate leave to visit her son Joseph, who was dying of cancer, was also denied. Joseph passed away at age 22 while Oakes was incarcerated. She was not permitted to attend his funeral.31
On April 6, 2016, a two-to-one majority of the Court of Appeal found that Oakes’ conviction was a miscarriage of justice and ordered a new trial. (The dissenting judge would have upheld the conviction.)32 The majority found that to reach this decision, it needed only consider the fact that Scott’s conviction had been overturned.33 The Crown at Oakes’ trial had placed “repeated emphasis on . . . Scott’s own guilty plea to the murder as vouching for her testimonial truthfulness.”34 Oakes’ conviction could not stand given the jury’s potential reliance on Scott’s guilty plea as support for her frail evidence.35 The majority also took particular note of Scott’s having identified Oakes “only after the police told [her] . . . that her own DNA was found in the Armstrong trailer” and that Oakes had said she was responsible.36
Rather than try her a second time, the Crown stayed the proceedings against Oakes on April 28, 2016. Meanwhile, Scott remained behind bars, waiting for her new trial to move forward. For months, the Crown did not fulfill its obligation to disclose the required materials for defence counsel’s trial preparation, despite being criticized by the court for this delay. Finally, on January 13, 2017—15 months after her conviction had been overturned—the Crown stayed the charge against Scott as well.37
Police claimed after Scott’s stay of proceedings that they had not known of her cognitive problems when interviewing her because “she did not present herself . . . to the investigators as someone who was developmentally delayed.”38 In an excerpt from her interrogation videos that has been made public, however, Scott says to police that she lied “my whole life pretty much.”39 When asked why she would seek this form of attention, Scott responds, “I don’t know. Psychiatrists, I really don’t know.”40 Shortly after, she explains that “[e]very time I get things mixed up in my own head and that’s why, that’s why I have been in special needs because I get things mixed up in my own head.”41
Kim Pate, who had since been appointed to the Senate, called for a public inquiry into Oakes’ and Scott’s wrongful convictions. She stated that both women, their families, and Armstrong’s family all deserved to know how this miscarriage of justice came about. Pate further observed that “prosecutors are supposed to be officers of the court, not individuals who are seeking convictions at all costs.”42 In May 2018, the Alberta Department of Justice issued a short statement that no inquiry would be held.43
Oakes filed a statement of claim for malicious prosecution against the Crown and Medicine Hat Police Service, asking for $1 million to compensate her for the wrongful conviction and incarceration. The Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench dismissed the lawsuit in May 2019.44
Casey Armstrong’s murder remains unsolved.45