03-27-2012, 04:55 PM
Quite Day in court, they were ahead of schedule also so they adjourned before 3pm. They will resume tomorrow at 10am, and the jury will not be sitting Thursday.
Globe&Mail - Roughly one hour after Michael Rafferty and Terri-Lynne McClintic allegedly abducted eight-year-old Victoria (Tori) Stafford in Woodstock, Mr. Rafferty showed up in Guelph and bought drugs from a woman he knew, his murder trial heard Tuesday,
The evidence came from prosecution witness Barbara Armstrong, 44.
She testified that she met the accused killer six years ago at a meat plant where they both worked, dated him for a few months, and subsequently sold him Percocets, a powerful prescription painkiller, about a dozen times.
This particular occasion was April 8, 2009. Ms. Armstrong described their relationship as “friends, confidants.”
Charged with first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual assault causing bodily harm, Mr. Rafferty 31, has pleaded not guilty on all counts.
Ms. Armstrong told prosecutor Michael Carnegie she arrived home from work and a chiropractor’s visit at around 4:30 p.m. to find Mr. Rafferty’s car parked outside, with a dark-haired woman in the passenger’s seat.
Ms. Armstrong made no mention of seeing a child in the vehicle. (The trial has been told that Tori was by then in the back seat of Mr. Rafferty’s Honda Civic, hidden under a coat.) She testified that Mr. Rafferty came inside the house, stayed for about 10 minutes and that she sold him the “Percs” for $3 apiece - a one-dollar markup from what she had paid.
She could not recall how many pills she gave him that time, but Ms. McClintic has told the trial that he emerged from the house with a sandwich bag filled with them, and that she thought he parted with about $300.
In other evidence Tuesday, the jury heard from a police officer who retraced the movements of Mr. Rafferty and Ms. McClintic later that same afternoon when they allegedly bought the hammer and garbage bags used to murder Tori and hide her body.
Since the trial got under way March 5, the jury has listened to an array of disturbing evidence about Tori’s death.
He had been the boyfriend of Ms. McClintic for just a few weeks when Tori vanished in Woodstock, in April, 2009, en route home from nearby Oliver Stephens Public School.
The Grade 3 student’s remains were discovered three months later, outside the small town of Mount Forest, 130 kilometres away, wrapped in green garbage bags and concealed beneath heavy rocks.
Ms. Armstrong also told the trial Tuesday that after the drug deal she next encountered Mr. Rafferty a couple of days late and that he appeared haggard.
“He said he hadn’t been eating or sleeping, that there were so many things going on in his life,” she recounted.
And he also mentioned Tori, who by then had become the focus of a huge search.
“He said that a friend of a friend’s daughter had gone missing and he was going to look for her,” Ms. Armstrong told the court.
“He had heard that it was drug-related, he said the mom owed a lot of money and that’s why (Tori) was taken.”
By then, the famous video of Tori leaving her school with an unidentified woman (now known to be Ms. McClintic) had been aired, and Mr. Rafferty told Ms. Armstrong “he thought he recognized the girl in the video,” she said.
He also told her he believed the police knew who the mystery woman was, too, and were forcefully trying to get her to confess.
Tori’s remains were found after police, aided by Ms. McClintic, had scoured the area for weeks.
The subsequent autopsy concluded Tori died as a result of massive injuries to her skull, inflicted by a hammer. She had also sustained fractured ribs and a lacerated liver - injuries that by themselves could have been fatal, In April, 2010, Ms. McClintic, now 21, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and is serving life imprisonment with scant prospect of parole for at least 25 years.
She is also the pivotal witness in the prosecution’s case against Mr. Rafferty.
But she complicated its task considerably by offering two different accounts of how the child was killed.
Days after she and Mr. Rafferty were jointly charged with murder, in May, 2009, Ms. McClintic told police that it was Mr. Rafferty who struck Tori with the hammer, bought just a couple of hours at a Guelph Home Depot.
And earlier in the trial the jury saw video clips from that police interview, in which a distraught Ms. McClintic described how Mr. Rafferty raped, kicked, stomped and finally beat the little girl to death, after covering her head with one of the garbage bags.
But in her trial evidence, Ms. McClintic testified that in fact it was she who wielded the murder weapon, in a sudden fit of blind, pent-up rage, triggered by the savage sexual assault she had just witnessed.
The bulk of her police statement, however, remains true, she told the trial: The abduction, the rape, the journey to Mount Forest and the post-murder efforts to dispose of evidence.
In other evidence Tuesday, the trial heard from OPP Det. Sgt. Dave Vittie, who described how he and colleagues pieced together the other movements of the two accused in Guelph that same day.
Bank records showed Mr. Rafferty making a series of transactions, while video footage from the Home Depot in Guelph showed Ms. McClintic buying the garbage bags and the orange-handled Wavex hammer and then placing the items in the trunk of Mr. Rafferty’s car, which then drove away.
Her last school picture
![[Image: tori-stafford.jpg?w=620]](http://nationalpostcomment.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/tori-stafford.jpg?w=620)
Globe&Mail - Roughly one hour after Michael Rafferty and Terri-Lynne McClintic allegedly abducted eight-year-old Victoria (Tori) Stafford in Woodstock, Mr. Rafferty showed up in Guelph and bought drugs from a woman he knew, his murder trial heard Tuesday,
The evidence came from prosecution witness Barbara Armstrong, 44.
She testified that she met the accused killer six years ago at a meat plant where they both worked, dated him for a few months, and subsequently sold him Percocets, a powerful prescription painkiller, about a dozen times.
This particular occasion was April 8, 2009. Ms. Armstrong described their relationship as “friends, confidants.”
Charged with first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual assault causing bodily harm, Mr. Rafferty 31, has pleaded not guilty on all counts.
Ms. Armstrong told prosecutor Michael Carnegie she arrived home from work and a chiropractor’s visit at around 4:30 p.m. to find Mr. Rafferty’s car parked outside, with a dark-haired woman in the passenger’s seat.
Ms. Armstrong made no mention of seeing a child in the vehicle. (The trial has been told that Tori was by then in the back seat of Mr. Rafferty’s Honda Civic, hidden under a coat.) She testified that Mr. Rafferty came inside the house, stayed for about 10 minutes and that she sold him the “Percs” for $3 apiece - a one-dollar markup from what she had paid.
She could not recall how many pills she gave him that time, but Ms. McClintic has told the trial that he emerged from the house with a sandwich bag filled with them, and that she thought he parted with about $300.
In other evidence Tuesday, the jury heard from a police officer who retraced the movements of Mr. Rafferty and Ms. McClintic later that same afternoon when they allegedly bought the hammer and garbage bags used to murder Tori and hide her body.
Since the trial got under way March 5, the jury has listened to an array of disturbing evidence about Tori’s death.
He had been the boyfriend of Ms. McClintic for just a few weeks when Tori vanished in Woodstock, in April, 2009, en route home from nearby Oliver Stephens Public School.
The Grade 3 student’s remains were discovered three months later, outside the small town of Mount Forest, 130 kilometres away, wrapped in green garbage bags and concealed beneath heavy rocks.
Ms. Armstrong also told the trial Tuesday that after the drug deal she next encountered Mr. Rafferty a couple of days late and that he appeared haggard.
“He said he hadn’t been eating or sleeping, that there were so many things going on in his life,” she recounted.
And he also mentioned Tori, who by then had become the focus of a huge search.
“He said that a friend of a friend’s daughter had gone missing and he was going to look for her,” Ms. Armstrong told the court.
“He had heard that it was drug-related, he said the mom owed a lot of money and that’s why (Tori) was taken.”
By then, the famous video of Tori leaving her school with an unidentified woman (now known to be Ms. McClintic) had been aired, and Mr. Rafferty told Ms. Armstrong “he thought he recognized the girl in the video,” she said.
He also told her he believed the police knew who the mystery woman was, too, and were forcefully trying to get her to confess.
Tori’s remains were found after police, aided by Ms. McClintic, had scoured the area for weeks.
The subsequent autopsy concluded Tori died as a result of massive injuries to her skull, inflicted by a hammer. She had also sustained fractured ribs and a lacerated liver - injuries that by themselves could have been fatal, In April, 2010, Ms. McClintic, now 21, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and is serving life imprisonment with scant prospect of parole for at least 25 years.
She is also the pivotal witness in the prosecution’s case against Mr. Rafferty.
But she complicated its task considerably by offering two different accounts of how the child was killed.
Days after she and Mr. Rafferty were jointly charged with murder, in May, 2009, Ms. McClintic told police that it was Mr. Rafferty who struck Tori with the hammer, bought just a couple of hours at a Guelph Home Depot.
And earlier in the trial the jury saw video clips from that police interview, in which a distraught Ms. McClintic described how Mr. Rafferty raped, kicked, stomped and finally beat the little girl to death, after covering her head with one of the garbage bags.
But in her trial evidence, Ms. McClintic testified that in fact it was she who wielded the murder weapon, in a sudden fit of blind, pent-up rage, triggered by the savage sexual assault she had just witnessed.
The bulk of her police statement, however, remains true, she told the trial: The abduction, the rape, the journey to Mount Forest and the post-murder efforts to dispose of evidence.
In other evidence Tuesday, the trial heard from OPP Det. Sgt. Dave Vittie, who described how he and colleagues pieced together the other movements of the two accused in Guelph that same day.
Bank records showed Mr. Rafferty making a series of transactions, while video footage from the Home Depot in Guelph showed Ms. McClintic buying the garbage bags and the orange-handled Wavex hammer and then placing the items in the trunk of Mr. Rafferty’s car, which then drove away.
Her last school picture
The only reason people get lost in thought is because it's unfamiliar territory.