It was a beautiful fall day in 1984.
After a long day at school a young girl in a small, quiet, community about an hour north of Toronto came home and dropped off her backpack.
Her brother and mother were out but when they came home, they found the house empty.
As time passed, concern grew, and they began to search the neighborhood.
Police were called as fear spread.
For months, the community combed fields, forests, and scoured the area looking for her.
Sadly, nearly three months later her body was found far from home.
I’m Craig Baird and this is Canadian History Ehx.
Today, I’m joined by Folklaur Chevrier to share how a family was forced to go through the unthinkable in their desperate search for answers, and the miscarriage of justice that kept them from finding who killed their daughter for over 35 years.
This is the story of Christine Jessop.
Christine Jessop was just a bright-eyed, feisty nine-year-old girl growing up in Queensville, Ont.
She liked baseball and riding her bike and she loved her pet beagle named Freckles.
Christine was a miracle baby born on Nov. 29, 1974, to Janet and Bob Jessop.
The couple had struggled to conceive and had adopted her older brother Kenney, five years earlier.
Christine was a happy child, even when things at home were challenging.
In the early-1980 Janet and Bob Jessop were struggling, which led to frequent arguments.
Bob’s poor financial decisions cost the family their house causing Janet and the kids to move to the family’s boat.
Gordon Simpson, Janet’s father often visited his daughter and grandchildren to ensure they had everything they needed.
One day, while on his way home from the marina, Gordon saw a nice house for sale.
He bought it in cash and Janet, and the kids moved into their new home in Queensville, ON.
Named in honour of Queen Victoria in 1843, the hamlet had a population of only a few hundred people.
It was the type of place where doors were unlocked, and everyone generally knew each other.
The family moved into a century old farmhouse that backed into a cemetery.
Queensville was calm, rural, and family-oriented and about halfway between Barrie and Toronto.
John Candy owned a farm nearby that was a frequent respite from the hustle and bustle of Hollywood.
Christine and Kenney made Queensville their home, and quickly joined baseball teams, made friends and generally enjoyed the freedom of small-town living.
Where they got to play until the streetlights came on.
But Bob Jessop was never home.
Janet told people he was away on business but those closest to her knew the truth.
He had been convicted of misappropriation of funds after he stole large sums of money from his special needs uncle.
On September 16, 1984, Bob began to serve an 18-month sentence.
Just over two weeks later, on Oct. 3, 1984, Janet made plans to visit him in prison.
It was a day the family would never forget.
At around 7am on October 3, 1984, Janet was on the phone.
She was talking to a family friend and in the background, they could hear Christine was very upset and crying.
Folklaur Chevrier, producer of the documentary series The Christine Jessop Story, said the young girl was inconsolable.
While Janet and Kenney visited Bobr, Christine was to go to school.
Janet put Christine on the school bus and waved at her daughter goodbye.
School that day was uneventful, but she did get a recorder, which she took with her on the school bus home.
She got off the bus and walked the extra long driveway home.
Janet and Ken were not expected home quite yet, and with some time to kill, Christine decided to go to the corner store to get some bubble gum.
The shopkeeper said that Christine came to the store alone between 3:30 and 4:00pm, bought bubble gum and left a minute or so later.
Christine was supposed to meet a friend from school at a nearby park but failed to show up.
When Janet and Kenney arrived home shortly after 4 p.m., they saw Christine’s backpack, but she was not there.
They searched the home and saw Freckles, the beagle, that Christine loved so much she wanted to be a vet, was acting strange.
In the garage, her bike was laying on the floor, which seemed odd.
According to Janet, Christine always put her bike up against the freezer.
As the sun set and the hours slowly ticked by, concern grew.
Janet and Kenney searched all the usual places and checked with friends.
Christine was nowhere to be found.
By then, streetlights were on and when Christine still wasn’t home, Janet knew that something was wrong.
At 8 p.m., Janet enlisted friends to help look for her missing daughter in the cemetery, nearby wells and local fields.
They combed the surrounding area thinking she could’ve had an accident and would soon be found.
When they realized Christine had vanished.
Janet called police.
By now it was around midnight.
Law enforcement agencies across Canada emphasize that you should report a missing person immediately to the police, because during the first 24 hours seconds matter.
It gives police the best chance to find a missing person, especially children, safely.
By Oct. 4, local news reported Christine’s disappearance, and The Jessops provided a list of people that were closest to them or within their inner circle to police.
By 4 p.m., Christine had been missing for24 hours, soon that became 48, which became 72.
On Oct. 6, Bob Jessop was granted early release on humanitarian grounds and over the next week, the search continued.
People walked through fields with sticks looking for her.
Divers scoured local ponds, and helicopters flew overhead.
News vans drove through the streets of Queensville looking for someone to talk to about Christine because her story had gripped the nation. By Halloween the search for Christine was aided by Crime Stoppers who offered a reward of $1,000 to anyone who had information about her whereabouts.
Meanwhile, the streets of Queensville were mostly empty of trick or treaters as parents feared for their children and didn’t want to risk an abduction while they were on the streets at night.
Then…days turned into weeks which turned into months.
Across Canada, as families celebrated Christmas, the Jessop family prepared to spend their holidays without their little girl.
They craved to know what had happened to Christine.
An answer was coming and it was the news no one wanted.
On Dec. 31, 1984, Fred Patterson was celebrating the last day of the year by hiking with his two daughters near Lake Scugog.
It’s a popular destination for those hoping to connect with nature, but that day, the hike proved to be harrowing.
As Patterson and his daughters walked the path, they noticed something they believed to be skeletal remains and called police.
When police arrived, they found a woodwind instrument with a name on it.
It was Christine’s recorder.
Police also found clothing, which matched what the 9-year-old had been wearing on the day she disappeared.
This discovery was the worst possible outcome.
New Year’s Eve, a child murder case. So, it goes from a missing person to a recovery then.
Christine had been sexually assaulted and stabbed the difficult task of telling The Jessop’s that Christine had been murdered fell to Reverend Bev Hall of St. Mary’s Anglican Church.
Bob said after finding out,
“In a way, it is good that it is over, in a sense of not knowing. But now it is a question of who did it.”
Little did he know that would take over 35 years.
On Jan. 7, 1985, Christine Jessop was laid to rest.
Nearly the entire community of Queensville was in attendance to pay their respects.
By now suspicions and rumours swirled and many looked around at the crowd and wondered if the killer was amongst them.
As it turned out, he was, but police had already set their sights on someone who didn’t attend the funeral at all.
The Jessop’s next-door neighbour.
Guy Paul Morin.
The Morin family purchased their home on Leslie St. in 1978 when they moved to Queensville.
Alphonse Morin was retired but he had been an engineer who taught at Seneca College.
His wife, Ida, had been a teacher, but had retired even though she continued to be a supply teacher when needed.
The couple had four girls and one boy, Guy Paul.
In October 1984, Guy Paul had been living with his parents while working as a finishing sander Interiors International Limited, a furniture manufacturing company.
On the day that Christine Jessop disappeared, his timecard showed he left work at 3:32 p.m.
On his way home he bought some groceries and walked through the front door of his parent’s home after 4:30 p.m. Just as he opened his door, his brother-in-law was preparing to leave and the two spoke for several minutes.
He placed the groceries in the kitchen, then had a nap while his mother made dinner.
At 6:30 p.m., Guy got up, ate with his parents and then helped his father with some work outside the house.
Police then arrived to speak with Guy’s mother Ida.
They asked about Christine.
The officer said later that Guy stared straight ahead and showed no interest in the conversation.
For the next few months, life continued as it had for the Morin family.
By December 1984, Guy was helping his father with renovations around the family home full time.
The family had no idea that Guy Paul Morin had raised suspicions and police saw him as their prime suspect.
By mid-February 1985, police had developed a number of suspects.
Traditional protocol in Ontario dictates that in situations where an abduction occurs in one jurisdiction and the body is found in another, the police force governing the area in which the remains are discovered has jurisdiction over the homicide investigation.
So, when Christine Jessop’s remains were discovered, in Durham Region, the Durham Regional Police Service automatically assumed jurisdiction for the investigation from the York Regional Police force which had investigated the child’s disappearance for approximately three months.
The FBI had created a profile of the perpetrator for York Regional police that stated He was sane and intelligent. That Christine had been his first victim.
He lived in the area and he knew Christine.
Following the discovery of her remains, two teams of detectives were assigned to the investigation, working independently of each other.
Detective Fitzpatrick and Inspector Shephard, and Detectives Joseph Loughlin and Reg Webster.
There was some element of competition as the team that developed the ‘best’ suspect would take ultimate control of the investigation.
Detectives Loughlin and Webster investigated three primary suspects.
On Feb. 14, 1985, Detective Fitzpatrick and Inspector Shephard began to zero in on Guy Paul Morin because fit many of the FBI’s profile criteria.
He was intelligent and could play several musical instruments and had even won multiple awards in the past few years. He lived in the area, and he knew the Jessops.
So, they narrowed in on his whereabouts on October 03, 1983.
Five days later, they began surveillance of the Morin home.
Shortly after Detective Fitzpatrick and Inspector Shephard interviewed Guy Paul on February 22, 1985, they became the lead investigators in the case.
By then they had spoken with neighbours and friends about the “weird” guy who lived next door.
Residents questioned why Guy did not help in the search for Christine or attend her funeral.
On April 22, 1984, investigators raided the Morin home and arrested Guy Paul Morin, the independent soul who loved beekeeping and playing the clarinet, was arrested as he drove to a community band practice.
He was charged with first-degree murder and was denied bail.
Guy Paul Morin then spent ten months in Whitby Jail awaiting trial.
On Jan. 7, 1986, Guy Paul Morin’s trial began. in London, Ontario.
The venue was moved from Toronto due to fear of bias.
For the people of Queensville, Guy was already guilty and rumours swirled that he had possibly killed two others, and that his family was incestuous.
Among the witnesses called to the trial was a jailhouse informant who said Guy had confessed the murder to him. He stated that Guy told him the way to deal with frustrations was to quote:
“Redrum the innocent”.
Redrum, murder spelled backwards, was a reference to The Shining.
Much of the evidence was circumstantial.
Although he had given blood, hair and other DNA samples to police upon his arrest the only hard evidence police had was described as “red animal hair”.
The hair was found in his car, in his house and apparently matched hair found on Christine.
But today we know there was major mishandling of evidence in the case and cross contamination could’ve been easily plausible.
The remains were scattered, and initial autopsies were incomplete.
In fact, The Jessops found bones left behind in the location where Christine had been found after she had been laid to rest and them themselves submitted the remains to police.
But by the time Guy Paul Morin was on trial he was seen as nothing less than the devil incarnate.
His own lawyer posited that Guy could have been suffering from schizophrenia and had a psychiatrist testify that Guy may have believed he was touching Christine with a magic wand when he stabbed her.
Through the month-long trial Guy Paul Morin claimed his innocence as the jury of 12 men and women began their deliberations on Feb 07, 1986.
For 14 hours, everyone waited until they made their decision.
When the judge asked if the jury had reached a verdict, the jury foreman stood up and said:
“Not guilty”
Guy Paul Morin was free.
Outside the courthouse he was swarmed by reporters and said that he was very happy with the verdict and quote:
“It has proven me as I am, innocent.”
Guy Paul Morin returned to Queensville, where he was still seen as guilty.
His family was harassed and they were told to leave the community as a petition circulated to get them to leave. Very few asked, if Guy Paul Morin was innocent, was the killer still free?
Without another suspect, The Crown appealed the verdict on the grounds that the trial judge made errors in his direction to the jury.
In 1987, the Court of Appeal of Ontario ordered a new trial.
Guy appealed the decision to the Supreme Court of Canada.
On November 17, 1988, The Supreme Court, ruled that the original trial judge had misdirected the jury on the application of the standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt to individual pieces of evidence.
The Court decided a new trial was warranted based on this error.
Guy Paul Morin surrendered himself to police.
But then the second trial was delayed due to Guy’s appeals regarding the Crown’s failure to disclose exculpatory evidence and other legal issues, including double jeopardy. Meanwhile, Christine’s body was exhumed, and a second autopsy was conducted.
The results were horrific.
Christine Jessop had been sexually assaulted and stabbed at least 200 times with many defensive wounds found.
The little girl had bravely fought for her life.
The horrors were too much to take for the Jessop family which had fallen apart since 1984.
Bob and Janet had split, with Janet living in a motel paid for by friends while Chrstine’s older brother battled alcoholism and now The Jessops would have to face another trial which began On Nov. 13, 1991, in London, ON.
The Crown now alleged that the killer had attempted to decapitate Christine after her murder.
Prosecutors and police called Guy a callous and sadistic killer. This was sensationalized in the media, further portraying Guy as a killer without remorse.
Later, Pathologists would state that the testimony of decapitation was incorrect and the broken vertebrae was due to being out in the elements for months.
As a quick note, this broken vertebra is the one that had been found by The Jessops not police.
The defence tried to muddy the waters of an already shocking case by attempting to blame Christine for her murder.
This caused Christine’s brother Ken to testify and reveal that he had been abused by two older youths for several years, including at least once when the youths forced Christine to be involved.
This led to Ken to be portrayed in the media as an abuser as many facts were heavily distorted and falsely reported.
Within days, retractions appeared in newspapers but had little effect.
The damage had already been done Soon after his testimony, he attempted to end his life.
Thankfully, he was found in time and taken to the hospital where he remained for the next month and a half.
Meanwhile, the trial of Guy Paul Morin continued as it became the longest murder trial in Canadian history at the time.
For nine months the crown presented a mostly circumstantial case, filled with holes and many believed Guy would be free in the end.
Finally, on July 23, 1992, The Crown rested its case.
This time, the jury deliberated not for hours but days.
On the 8th day, they had reached a verdict.
Guilty.
Guy Paul Morin was sentenced to life in prison.
For the family of Christine Jessop, it felt like their agonizing ordeal had finally come to an end.
The man they believed had killed Christine would spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Despite the guilty verdict, Guy continued to state he was innocent.
And the thing is…he was but he still began to serve his life sentence on July 30, 1992.
Rather than put him in his own cell, as was common for those convicted of murdering a child, Guy was sent to general population.
This put him at great risk from the other inmates.
Guy described himself as quote:
“Scared beyond belief”
But Guy was not attacked.
His fellow inmates had followed the case and believed he was wrongfully convicted.
When his sister visited him, they told her that he was being looked after.
They weren’t the only ones to believe his innocence.
On August 22, 1992, the Justice for Guy Paul Morin Committee filed an appeal.
The volunteers then applied for his release on bail, which was granted on Feb. 9, 1993.
A year later, his lawyers filed an amended notice of appeal.
By then science was also catching up, and advancements in DNA technology allowed for positive matching between samples collected at crime scenes and taken from those convicted of crimes.
Guy Paul Morin was more than happy to provide DNA to prove his innocence.
His DNA was tested against semen samples that had been found on Christine’s underwear.
On Jan. 23, 1995, Guy Paul Morin was exonerated.
For a decade, Guy Paul Morin had stated his innocence Finally, science proved it.
A month after Guy was cleared of the crime, the Christine Jessop case was transferred to the Toronto Police.
They formed a nine-man task force to find the killer.
For the next four weeks, the task force interviewed 300 suspects before disbanding.
Christine Jessop’s case had gone cold.
The wrongful conviction of Guy Paul Morin had many asking how such a thing could have happened.
On June 26, 1996, the Commission on Proceedings Involving Guy Paul Morin, led by former Quebec Court of Appeal judge Fred Kaufman, was formed.
It would determine what happened and to find ways to prevent such a thing from occurring again.
Hearings began on Feb. 10, 1997, and continued for the next 146 days.
During that time, 120 witnesses were called and 100,000 pages of documents were brought forward.
The inquiry found many deficiencies in how evidence was collected and handled including the lack of a grid search of the crime scene area.
The crime scene was also not sealed from the public and there were allegations that ice was melted off the body with hair dryers as gardening tools were used to dig up the evidence.
The inquiry also found what was termed “noble cause corruption” or “tunnel vision” in investigators which led them to force the evidence to fit their theory of the case and not let the evidence point them in the right direction.
That included influencing the Jessop family in their memory of events.
Since Guy Paul Morin did not get home from work until 4:35 p.m., and Ken Jessop stated he had arrived home with his mom at 4:10 p.m., police pushed Ken and Janet to believe their memory of the time was wrong.
The Kaufman Report was issued on April 9, 1998. It contained 1,380 pages and 119 recommendations.
Most of the recommendations dealt with ways that police and prosecutors could avoid developing a narrow mindset by including new interview techniques, and improved methods for gathering and storing evidence.
The case of Guy Paul Morin is a landmark in Canadian legal history because it was instrumental in highlighting the importance of DNA evidence and the need for systemic changes to the justice system.
The Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted was formed as a result of his case and as a result of a negotiated civil litigation settlement Guy Paul Morin received a $1.25 million in compensation.
He got married, had two sons and has largely stayed out of the public eye ever since.
While Guy Paul Morin was able to taste freedom again, but he was tainted by the whole ordeal.
The family of Christine Jessop remained trapped in not knowing what had happened to her.
Without any new leads it seemed like her case would go unsolved forever.
Finding the person who killed her daughter is all Janet Jessop has wanted for more than 35 years.
And it’s also what Detective Steve Smith of the Toronto Police Services Cold Case Unit wanted.
He remembered the case and followed it when he was younger so when he was invited to attend a two-week training course where the techniques used to catch the Golden State Killer were taught, Detective Smith quickly came up to speed on the intricacies of Familial DNA and Genetic Genealogy.
He thought Christine’s case could be solved using this innovative technique which combines DNA analysis with genealogical research by matching a sample to a DNA database to determine a familial relationship and identify a likely suspect.
For six months Detective Smith and Anthony Redgrave, a forensic genetic genealogist, worked to identify the killer.
Then on October 9, 2020, Toronto Police positively identified Christine Jessop’s killer.
Then less than a week later Toronto Police Chief James Ramer sat next to a screen during a news conference at Toronto Police Headquarters.
On Thursday, Oct. 15, 2020, Calvin Hoover was identified as the person who sexually assaulted and murdered Christine Jessop.
The Hoover family had been close with the Jessop’s.
Heather Hoover worked as a dispatcher at Eastern Independent Telecom.
Her husband, Calvin, worked there as a cable installer working alongside the lead hand of cable installer, Bob Jessop.
The two families often went to each other’s homes for barbecues and birthdays.
On the day Christine went missing Janet made three phone calls.
She called Bob’s lawyer, his boss and Heather Hoover.
It is believed Calvin met Christine outside the Jessop’s home and said that he was taking her to see her father.
He hung her coat on the hook too high for her to have done herself while she grabbed her recorder to show her father.
Investigators think he planned the abduction for some time and had a site already in his mind.
The Hoover family had a cabin near where her body was found, and investigators believe he killed her there and then moved the body to where it was eventually found.
After Christine disappeared, Calvin was out looking for her.
He attended her funeral and was at the Jessop’s family home afterwards.
Early in the case, Calvin’s name was in the files, but police didn’t investigate any further and he was never even questioned.
While Guy Paul Morin suffered for a decade as an accused killer, Calvin Hoover walked free until 2015 when he took his own life via carbon monoxide poisoning in Port Hope, Ontario.
During the autopsy, a blood sample was collected and put on file at the Centre of Forensic Sciences laboratory in Toronto.
Five years later, Toronto Police issued a warrant, one of the first ones in Canada, to use a deceased person’s DNA to match a sample discovered through genetic genealogy.
That is how police finally got Christine Jessop’s killer.
Ken Jessop said his mom had finally found peace. He said,
“She’s happy with the news, she’s upset it was someone we knew well.”
Hoover will never stand trial for his crime and went to his grave believing he got away with murder.
George Simpson, Christine’s grandfather died believing Guy Paul Morin had killed her.
He died feeling guilty for purchasing the house next door.
Janet Jessop died on March 15, 2024, finally knowing what happened to her daughter.
And Ken Jessop overcame his personal demons and became sober on March 7, 2022.
Today, he helps other people with their grief and addictions.
On the 40th anniversary of Christine’s disappearance he buried his mom alongside his sister.
If you’re interested in seeing this incredible story, make sure you watch THE CHRISTINE JESSOP STORY on Crave. It was produced by my guest Folklaur Chevrier and it’s available to stream right now.
As for The Guy Paul Morin case – it was the second major wrongful conviction case to occur in the modern era of the Canadian criminal justice system, and his landmark case helped other wrongful convicted people find freedom.
As I mentioned earlier, the Defence of the Wrongly Convicted, was created to help exonerate Guy Paul Morin.
But the volunteers behind it did not stop once Guy was free.
They began looking at other cases where miscarriages of justice had occurred.
If sufficient new evidence was available, the organization applied for a ministerial review.
One of their most notable victories was David Milgaard who had spent over twenty years behind bars for a murder he didn’t commit.
You may remember his story from the Tragically Hip’s song Wheat Kings, the greatest Canadian song ever written in my opinion.
In January 1969, 16-year-old Milgaard and his friends Ron Wilson and Nichol John embarked on a trip across Canada.
The three were in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, visiting their friend Albert Cadrain when a 20-year-old nursing student, Gail Miller, was found dead on a snowbank nearby.
Under pressure to solve the crime police focused their attention on Milgaard, Wilson and John.
Milgaard was charged with murder, and his friends were coerced by police into giving false confessions and he was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison on January 31, 1970.
On July 18, 1997, a DNA laboratory in the United Kingdom confirmed that semen samples on the victim’s clothing did not originate from Milgaard, and effectively exonerated Milgaard. And through it all the Defence of the Wrongly Convicted was there to help.
Since its inception, the organization has been directly involved in exonerating 29 wrongful convictions.
It is estimated that each year, its lawyers donate $3.5 million in pro bono hours to the organization.
Today, Defence of the Wrongly Convicted is known as Innocence Canada.
