The Ontario Court of Appeal has overturned the first degree murder conviction in the 2008 death of a
Christopher McDonald, was convicted in 2012 of aggravated sexual assault and the first degree murder of Corrine Burns. He was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.
The retrial was granted on the grounds that the original trial judge erred in his final charge to the jury and erred in allowing evidence from a subsequent assault conviction McDonald had in
The naked and badly beaten body of Burns was found on the morning of May 27, 2008, by a Grade 8 student playing a game of hide-and-seek in Norm Jary Park in the city’s west end.
McDonald was arrested for her murder in 2010 and at the end of his four-week trial in 2012 it took a jury just five hours to find him guilty.
At sentencing Justice Jack Belleghem called McDonald “brutally sadistic.”
At the murder trial court heard that Burns, 29, had mental health issues, a drug addiction and worked as a prostitute.
She was last seen alive by a taxi driver in the early hours of the morning of May 25, 2008.
Her body was found in a wooded area of the park, apparently having been dragged there.
Semen was found on her body that matched the DNA profile of McDonald, as did organic material found under one of her fingernails.
Burns’ body contained a “potentially lethal” level of cocaine that a forensic toxicologist testified was in excess of what would be considered a level associated with recreational use.
The exact cause of death was never identified. The pathologist that conducted the post-mortem testified that there was more than one possible explanation for why she died, including strangulation or a cocaine overdose.
The appeal court found that the trial judge failed to give “enough attention” to the cause of death when giving his final charge to the jury and that he failed to point out evidence that showed it was unlikely a blow to the head was the sole cause of death.
McDonald did not testify at his murder trial.
