Sobs resounded in a packed courtroom yesterday as families of three murder victims described the devastating impact a "demon" had visited on their lives by killing their loved ones, including a married couple of 51 years that Jesse Imeson tied up in their basement and shot.
The statements came after Mr. Imeson, 23, of Windsor, Ont., pleaded guilty to three counts of second-degree murder in killings that sowed terror in several communities in July, 2007.
"Our lives were shattered," said Carol Denomy, daughter of victims Helene and Bill Regiers, who left behind six children, 16 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
"It was sudden, violent, undeserved and defenceless."
Mr. Imeson had been charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of Mrs. Regier, 73, and her 72-year-old husband. He pleaded guilty to the lesser charge, and was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.
He also pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for killing student Carlos Rivera, 25, in Windsor, a few days before he shot the Regiers.
He was sentenced to life without parole eligibility for 15 years on that count.
"Carlos, in a way, helped take a demon out of society," the victim's brother, Hugo Rivera, said in a statement.
Hands shackled at the waist, the clean-shaven Mr. Imeson, wearing a black dress shirt, blue jeans and black running shoes, showed no signs of remorse. At times, he smirked or glared at family members and the media in the packed courtroom, but mostly he looked straight ahead impassively.
According to an agreed statement of facts, Mr. Imeson strangled Mr. Rivera with a belt after waking up and finding the architecture student performing a sex act on him.
The two had spent much of the night drinking after they struck up a conversation on July 17, 2007, at the Tap, a gay strip club in Windsor where Mr. Rivera worked part time as a bartender and Mr. Imeson had gone looking for work as an exotic dancer.
"The gay guy - if I had to do it again, I would do it," Mr. Imeson would later tell an undercover police officer.
After killing Mr. Rivera, Mr. Imeson fled north to Grand Bend, Ont., along the Lake Huron shoreline.
Mr. Imeson ditched Mr. Rivera's car when he realized police were looking for it, and broke into a dry shed, where he found a .22 semi-automatic rifle and 200 rounds of ammunition.
On July 22, he smashed his way into the farmhouse where Mr. Regier was born and raised, and ordered the couple at gunpoint into the basement.
He cut the telephone line, using the cord to tie Mrs. Regier's hands in front of her. He used a cord cut from a clothes iron to bind her husband - hands outstretched on either side of him - to joists and pipes.
He then shot Mrs. Regier four times in the chin, shoulder, neck and chest; and her husband three times - twice in the chest and once in the temple - leaving her bleeding to death on the ground and her dying husband in a half-standing position, held up by his bound hands.
"What's to know?" he later told a detective. "Shots were fired. People died."
Mr. Imeson fled in the Regiers' truck, sparking an intense search.
He was captured on July 31, outside Portage-du-Fort, Que., near the Ontario boundary after triggering a remote control camera set by a bear hunter in thick bush where he had tried to hide the stolen truck.
When the judge asked him whether he wanted to say anything, Mr. Imeson said no. But his lawyer read a statement in which the killer said he was "very sorry," an apology relatives of his victims denounced as "hollow."
"I will be an old man before I am released, if I ever am," the statement read. "I am truly sorry. Please forgive me."
Mr. Rivera's family wasn't in much of a forgiving mood.
"Jesse Imeson embodies the worst in human nature," they said in a statement. "This coward deserved far worse than what was dealt to him."
Mr. Justice Roland Haines of Ontario Superior Court, who called the killings "savage and senseless," noted the practical effect of the sentencing was the same as for first-degree murder, which automatically carries no parole possibility for 25 years.
Crown lawyer Bob Morris said the convicted multiple killer would not even be eligible to ask for parole after 15 years under the "faint-hope" provisions of the Criminal Code.
Defence lawyer Don Crawford said Mr. Imeson was just nine years old when he discovered the body of his father, who had killed himself.
The troubled youth spent years in and out of group homes because his mother was unable to cope with him, racking up convictions for uttering forged documents and assault.