Crown concedes defence appeal in 1994 double murder days after charges against co-accused stayed
Last week, Crown stayed murder charges against co-accused
The Crown has consented to a retrial for one of the men accused in a 30-year-old double murder, just days after abandoning the prosecution of a second man facing the same charges.
In 2023 Leonard Cochrane, 55, was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in the 1994 fatal shootings of Barry Buchart and Trevor Deakins.
Cochrane appealed his convictions, but the case hadn't yet make it to a hearing.
Instead the Crown conceded the defence appeal, citing a "disclosure issue," according to Cochrane's lawyer Balfour Der.
The news comes after charges against Cochrane's co-accused, Stuart MacGregor, were dropped on Friday due to what the prosecution called "a significant issue with the evidence."
Charges were laid in the once-cold case with the help of genetic genealogical investigative techniques.
Investigators tracked down family members of the suspect, which ultimately led to Cochrane's arrest after his DNA was matched to blood found at the crime scene.
"We're pleased with that decision [to concede the appeal], but we felt we had some good grounds of appeal to pursue on very novel points that no doubt would have found their way to the Supreme Court of Canada," said Der.
Buchart, 26, and Deakins, 25, were killed in 1994 in their home in the southeast community of Radisson Heights. Both victims were shot at point-blank range.
At the time, Buchart sold marijuana.
In Cochrane's trial, the judge found that he was one of two masked men who broke into the victims' home on July 11, 1994, to steal drugs or money.
Cochrane was arrested in 2020, MacGregor was charged three years later.
The Crown must now decide its next move; schedule a retrial or stay the charges as they did for MacGregor.
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