Russell Maurice JOHNSON, Canada. (1 Viewer)

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Eat Shit And Die

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A.K.A.: "The Bedroom Strangler"

Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: Rape
Number of victims: 7 +
Date of murders: 1973 - 1977
Date of birth: 1947
Victims profile: Mary Hicks, 20 / Alice Ralston, 42 / Eleanor Hartwick / Doris Brown, 49 / Diane Beitz, 23 / Luella George, 22 / Donna Veldboom, 22
Method of murder: Strangulation - Stabbing with knife
Location: London, Ontario and Guelph, Ontario, Canada
Status: Found not guilty by reason of insanity, February 1978. Incarcerated at the Oak Ridge maximum-security facility of the Mental Health Centre in Penetanguishene, Ontario
 

Eat Shit And Die

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One of Canada's most notorious serial killers, a man who terrorized women in southern Ontario during the 1970s, is making a temporary move to Brockville.
Dr. John Bradford said Monday that Russell Johnson will be transferred to the medium security forensic unit at the Brockville Mental Health Centre for what he called a temporary treatment consultation.
That consultation, which Bradford said will examine what types of treatment are suitable for Johnson and their possible effectiveness, was ordered by the Ontario Review Board following a hearing last October.
Bradford will conduct the assessment and would not say when the temporary move will happen, or if it has already.
"It is certainly happening and it will be happening. We will be implementing the order," said Bradford, associate chief of the Royal Ottawa Health Care Group responsible for forensic psychiatry.
The Brockville facility is part of the Royal Ottawa group.
Johnson, 61, has been confined to the maximum security Oak Ridge psychiatric institution in Penetanguishine since 1978 when he was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the killings of three women.
Johnson was sent to trial for the murders of two women from London, Donna Veldboom, 22, and Luella George, 22, as well as 23-year-old Diane Beitz of Guelph.
According to published reports, since that '78 court decision, he has confessed to killing four other women and several sexual assaults.
He has been dubbed the 'Bedroom Strangler' because his victims were smothered to death in their beds. In some of the attacks, Johnson scaled apartment walls as high as 15 storeys to reach his victims.
Brockville Police Deputy Chief Adrian Geraghty said the force is aware of Johnson's pending transfer here. He said the serial killer's move to the Brockville psychiatric facility is not currently a concern to police.
"No we don't have any concerns. He's got restricted conditions on him and the mental health people will advise us if there are any concerns," he said.
Bradford said if Johnson were to have any access to the community during his temporary stay, "It would be under police escort."
"Brockville Mental Health Centre will notify us at such time if he is ever to enter the community," confirmed Geraghty.
Bradford stressed the review board, which controls the movement of patients within Ontario's forensic mental health system, closely examined the request last fall.
The hearing would have included input from the Crown on any public safety concerns, information about security at the Brockville facility and Johnson's decades-long record while institutionalized.
Although he would not reveal the exact timeline for Johnson's stay, Bradford said, "It's a matter of months rather than a year."
He dismissed the suggestion the assessment here is necessarily a step toward Johnson being permanently transferred to medium security.
"It's one thing coming for consultation," said Bradford. "It's very much another coming on a permanent basis with rehabilitation over time being put in place."
Johnson's request for a transfer to Brockville from Penetanguishine has been turned down in the past.
A London Free Press article on a transfer request Johnson made during a hearing in 2000 quoted the counsel for the attorney general as opposing the move.
"He's too great of a risk to be released from maximum security - the problem being that in medium security facilities, there are women patients," said Geoff Beasley.
"He represents a risk to women patients."
Beasley, then an assistant Crown attorney in London, had been connected with Johnson's case for 11 years.
When asked yesterday about the threat Johnson presents to staff and patients, Bradford conceded in forensic psychiatry, "there is never such a thing as no risk. ... What the issue is is a risk-management approach to it."
He said measures including separating Johnson from female patients could be taken, but didn't say if such risk-management steps will be taken ahead of Johnson's arrival.
Bradford was careful to note that unlike some patients who come for an assessment, Johnson has a detail record from his time in Penetanguishine that can help manage his risk today.
"There's a long-standing institutional record which has been very good," he noted.
Further, he said Johnson has been temporarily released to other psychiatric facilities in the past for treatment consultations.
Could a person with Johnson's violent history ever be released?
Bradford said in his 30-year career, he has rehabilitated people with extremely violent pasts.
"A number of them now who have been in the community for more than 10 years and have never committed another offence," he added.
That said, Bradford stressed: "The opportunity of ever being able to treat and rehabilitate somebody with a serious history of sexually motivated homicide is pretty rare."

 

Eat Shit And Die

★Filthy European★
Mary Hicks - London - October 1973
Alice Ralston - Guelph - November 1973
Eleanor Hartwick - London - March 1974
Doris Brown - Guelph - August 1974
Diane Beitz - Guelph - December 1974
Luella George - London - April 1977
Donna Veldboom - London - July 1977
 
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