Inquest into triple murders of Ottawa Valley women reaches halfway point

On day eight of the inquest into the murders of Carol Culleton, Anastasia Kuzyk, and Nathalie Warmerdam in the Ottawa Valley, jurors heard from OPP officers who responded that fateful day in September 2015, who unveiled the sequence of what happened.

OPP Supt. Derek Needham was the critical incident commander on the day of the murders and was responsible for the events that unfolded.

"There was nothing normal or typical about that day. I can't recall another incident in Ontario like it," Needham testified.

Needham said that the first call made into on police on Sept. 22, 2015, was of Kuzyk's murder, with police believing former partner Basil Borutski was still inside her Wilno, Ont. residence.

Needham testified that given the information police had at the time at the scene of Kuzyk's murder, he was "very sure nothing would have changed the trajectory of our response."

It wasn't until the second call came into police later that morning of Warmerdam's murder in Cormac that police discovered they were wrong.

Recalling that tragic day, OPP Det.-Const. Stacey Solman said Culleton, who was Borutski's first victim at her cottage near Kamaniskeg Lake, "wasn't even on their radar."

Needham testified that the biggest piece of unknown information was that Borutski was still not at the residence of the presumed first victim. He says if police had known that, things may have turned out different.

"I can tell from the questions that the jury is asking and the way in which the jury is engaging with the issues that I think they are seeing quite clearly what the critical gaps are," says lawyer Kirsten Mercer, who is serving as counsel to the Ending Violence Against Women chapter in Renfrew County.

Police admit they were duped by Borutski, who they say was very good at manipulation. Police explained how Borutski made it appear he was living at one residence with footprints in the yard and having the driveway plowed, when in reality his whereabouts were unknown.

"The idea that this is something awful that only happens somewhere else to other people was shattered pretty effectively on that day," Mercer told CTV News.

Another seven days of hearings is to come in Pembroke at the Best Western Hotel and Conference Centre, which will include firearms specialists and experiences from intimate partner violence survivors.