deadmonton - the trial of michael white - november 7th, 2006
Liana White, 29, was stabbed to death July 12th, 2005.
Michael White, then 28, was charged with second-degree murder and offering an indignity to a dead body.
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The trial of Michael White continued November 6th with closed-door arguments between both sides. At stake was the admissibilty of evidence the Crown planned to introduce during the trial's next-day session.
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The trial proper resumed with Paul Beaudoin on the stand facing cross-examination from White's defence lawyer Robert Shaigec.
Beaudoin was confronted with statements he made to police 16 months earlier.
He had earlier said he was unsure of the colour of the SUV he spotted while returning home early from work, and was even less sure of the identity of the driver.
Under questioning by Shaigec, Beaudoin reduced his certainty of placing Michael White behind the wheel from nearly 100% to just 50-50.
The defence also succeeded in having Beaudoin change the time he said he saw the now-colourless Ford Explorer from 5:00 a.m. to between 5:30 and 5:45 a.m.
A 5-foot 4-inch female police constable told the court about her experience when she got inside the SUV while it was parked at a police garage.
She said she could not reach the steering wheel with her hands or touch the gas pedal despite wearing police-issue boots with one-inch soles.
The trial then focused on the evidence police collected in the White's home and in a ditch along Rural Route 251 at Township Road 542 near a field used by the Edmonton Radio Control Society for flying remote controlled airplanes.
Crown prosecutor Troy Couillard asked police Const. James Johnstone to outline the process he used in gathering and cataloguing the evidence.
Johnstone told the court he used Luminol – a chemiluminescent compound that reacts with iron in hemoglobin producing a neon-like glow under blue light – to look for blood evidence.
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Johnstone illustrated his findings with normal-light and blue-light photographs of the White's bedroom.
He showed similar pictures of the hallway leading from the bedroom, the front entrance of the house and the garage.
Johnstone further testified blood was found on a bottle of Vim cleaner and above a deadbolt on a door.
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The same process was used to reveal the presence of blood in the rear of the Ford Explorer.
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The jurors were then shown numerous binders containing over 100 photographs.
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Also entered into evidence were photographs of Liana's decomposing body covered with tree branches and leaves.
Referring to it as the 'body recovery site,' Johnstone showed the jurors pictures taken at the remote road side of a leg protruding from the undergrowth and Liana White's leaf-covered face. In one photograph her blood-soaked bare right foot is barely visible.
The area where Liana's body was found was a dumping ground of all sorts. Johnstone stated that near her corpse was a broken toilet among other sundry articles of debris.
Throughout the day's proceedings, Michael White sat in the prisoner's box, swallowing hard, often wiping his nose, and holding his head in his hands while rubbing his red-rimmed eyes.
His lawyer handed him a box of tissues. One veteran reporter said White looked 'shaken.'
A middle-aged juror was observed crying, wiping tears from her face as she looked through the thick binders of photographs documenting the fate of Liana White.
The trial continued November 8th, 2006