BURST
A crime scene photographer was taking pictures of a dead couple’s bedrooms when he heard a person leave a message on an answering machine about “suspicious credit card purchases.”
The phone call would eventually help investigators link three young men to the murders of Arnold and Joanne De Jong, who were killed in their Abbotsford home in May 2022.
On Tuesday morning in Abbotsford court, Const. Derek Mealings explained a series of photos he took a day after the couple’s bodies were found. Arnold, 77, was lying in his bed with duct tape wrapped around his face, he said. Two receipts and a business card were found under his body.
The prosecutor has said evidence will show he died of asphyxiation due to smothering.
His wife, Joanne, 76, was found in her bed surrounded by blood. Three pieces of duct tape were also found near her body. The prosecutor has said she died of sharp and blunt force trauma.
Both had their hands and feet bound together with rope.
Khushveer Toor, 22, Gurkaran Singh, 20, and Abhijeet Singh, 22, were arrested and charged with two counts each of first-degree murder in December 2022.
On Monday, prosecutor Dorothy Tsui told the court Gurkaran Singh arrived in Canada as an international student less than a month before the murders. He was expected to study at Northern Lights College in Dawson Creek, but never attended.
In her opening statement, Tsui alleged the men were motivated by “debt, financial pressure and greed,” and they knew the older couple lived alone and owned a trucking business. Abhijeet Singh operated a company that had cleaned the roofs and gutters of the couple’s Abbotsford home about a month before they were killed, as well as another time about a year before.
She said evidence would be presented to show the men stole a Visa card, cheques and a pressure washer, which was later sold, calling the deaths “senseless”.
The De Jongs, along with their children and grandchildren, celebrated Mother’s Day together the day before the couple’s bodies were found on May 9. Joanne played hide-and-seek with her three grandkids, while Arnold visited with his daughters and their husbands.
At night, Arnold’s sister visited the couple. She left at about 10 p.m. When she called them on the next morning, she was unable to reach them and phoned one of their daughters. Joanne’s body was found by her son-in-law, who called police.
The murder trial has been delayed several times over the last 3½ years.
Toor, Gurkaran Singh and Abhijeet Singh first chose to be tried by judge and jury, before switching to judge alone. An adjournment was granted in 2023. All three were then scheduled to go to trial in May 2024, but the two Singhs applied for a delay. Toor’s trial was severed from the other two, and he later applied for a return to judge and jury. The request was denied. He also fired his lawyer, resulting in another delay.
In October, Gurkaran Singh and Abhijeet Singh applied to have their trials delayed again because their lawyers were busy with other trials, but their request was denied.
The case came close to reaching the time limit established by the Jordan ruling to ensure timely access to trial in Canada. An investigation by the Canadian Press found that 26 criminal cases in B.C. have been thrown out since 2023 because they were not tried before the limits established in the ruling.
Outside court earlier this week, the couple’s daughter Sandra Barthel said the family was disappointed in the justice system.
“We are so appreciative of Crown counsel, but we are so frustrated with delay after delay. … We don’t understand how a system like that in such a civilized country can even exist.”
Her sister Kimberley Coleman said she is grateful the court case has finally started.
“There was a possibility of the three court trials occurring separately, but we’re happy the day has finally come and that hopefully some justice — although there is no justice in this case to lose your parents like this — but we’re hoping that some justice will be done.”
Barthel said the murders continue to feel like a nightmare for her family.
“It’s unimaginable to think that we (celebrated) Mother’s Day that day. We were playing with our kids, we were chatting with our parents, we had lunch together, we had dinner together, we were laughing. And that next morning (we couldn’t) get ahold of them, and then to arrive at their home to find that somebody had killed them is like a nightmare. And it continues to be a nightmare,” she said.
“Yet all we can do every day is to get up and try to keep living in their honour and in their memory. We keep trying to think back to that day and to the love that was in that home, and we choose to try to focus on the blessing that they were, and try not to focus so much on the evil that took them.”
Barthel’s husband Brian said the family is relying on their Christian faith.
“We know where they are, and we have comfort in that,” he said. “We hold onto that comfort, but we also want justice to be done in the right way. And we hold onto that too.”
The daughters said the family has received support from many family and friends, with more than 50 people attending the trial each day.
“That’s what holds us up. We don’t take that lightly,” said Coleman. “It goes to show who our dad and mom were.”