For three decades, a brutal series of cold case attacks confounded police in southern Ontario. Between 1992 and 1995, an unidentified attacker violently bound three children as young as eight in local parks, sexually assaulting each victim before escaping. On Monday, prosecutors told a jury in Brampton, Ontario, that modern DNA evidence has finally linked those horrific crimes to Richard Neil, now 67. As Neil’s trial began, Crown attorney Shazin Karim detailed the assaults, which involved anal penetration and urination, and stressed to the jury that the victims were children. The victims included an eight-year-old boy, a 10-year-old boy, and a 15-year-old girl. Neil has pleaded not guilty to 17 charges, including kidnapping, sexual assault causing bodily harm, and administering a stupefying drug. His defense disputes that Neil was the perpetrator, though the victims’ accounts of the attacks are not contested. Karim explained to the jury that investigators first identified Neil as a suspect in recent years through genetic genealogy analysis performed in the United States. This forensic technique compares crime scene DNA profiles against genetic data submitted voluntarily to direct-to-consumer genealogical platforms, a technology that did not exist when the crimes occurred. Following the genealogy lead, police gathered additional evidence positively identifying Neil. According to the Crown’s opening statement, Neil’s fingerprints matched those lifted from a bag and a bottle carried by the attacker during the incidents. Furthermore, his DNA matched biological samples recovered from all three crime scenes: Norton Place Park in Brampton, Idlewood Park in Kitchener, and Wildwood Park in Oakville. Seated beside his defense lawyer Leo Adler in a dark suit jacket and white button-down shirt, Neil watched the proceedings and glanced at jurors during the Crown’s statement. An indictment filed in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice additionally accuses Neil of producing a videotape recording constituting child pornography on the date of the Oakville attack. Publication bans protect the identities of all the victims. Karim noted that employment records place Neil working at Canada Post in Waterloo during the time of the 1992 Kitchener assault. Additionally, when authorities seized Neil’s electronic devices following his 2024 arrest, they discovered media files indicating a personal interest in urine drinking, matching specific details from the historical assaults.
Source: cbc.ca
