Sharlene Bosma interview: The trial and telling her daughter why daddy can't come back
Bosma's killers, Dellen Millard and Mark Smich, were found guilty of 1st degree murder Friday
Tomorrow, on Father's Day, Sharlene Bosma will visit her husband's grave with their five-year-old daughter.
Their little one will climb all over his headstone, and dance around, and play in the cemetery next to her father.
There will be questions. Lots of questions.
"We have a lot of talks about the bad men. For a long time she was worried they were going to come back while mommy was sleeping," Sharlene Bosma said in an interview with the CBCs Nil Koksal on Saturday.
"So for two years, she slept beside me."
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- Millard and Smich guilty of 1st-degree murder
Easing her daughter's fears will come a little bit easier now. On Friday, Dellen Millard and Mark Smich were both found guilty of the first degree murder of Hamilton's Tim Bosma.
Both men have been sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole for 25 years, or at least until 2038. It took a 12-person jury five days to decide the two were guilty of murder.
And with those convictions, a weight came off of the Bosma family.
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"We just kind of felt like, for three years, we've been slowly collecting cinder blocks and dragging them along behind us — and we didn't know that they were there," Sharlene Bosma said.
"And then yesterday, those ropes, those tethers were cut … and the biggest burden that we didn't know was there was lifted."
Searching for the truth
It has been three torturous years for the tight-knit, church-going family from the suburban Ancaster, Ont. area. On May 6, 2013, Bosma went on a test drive with Millard and Smich in the pickup truck he was trying to sell.
He never came home. After days of frantic searching, police found human remains believed to be Bosma's inside an animal incinerator on Millard's farm.
No one truly knows what happened to Tim Bosma that night. "The one person who could probably tell us the actual truth isn't here," his widow said.
Does she want those answers? Does she want the truth?
"I don't know," Bosma said. She believes that the Crown's version of events — that Bosma was shot in a field near his home — is the closest she's going to get.
She calls Smich's explanation of what happened that night "very well coached and planned." She scoffs at any suggestion that the version of events put forth by Millard's lawyers might contain some semblance of the truth.
A kind man who is deeply missed
In the end, it doesn't really matter, because Bosma refuses to let her husband be defined by the way he died, instead of the life he lived — as a fun, caring and loving husband and father.
Instead, she plans to focus her energy on picking up the pieces, healing, and being there for her daughter. She doesn't lie to her about what happened to her dad, for the sake of making it easier for a young child to digest.
"The bad men hurt daddy so bad he couldn't get better," she tells her.
"We've had some pretty heavy conversations. We've talked about heaven and what death is."
Sharlene is fiercely protective of her daughter, and refuses to tell anyone her name in interviews. She wants to keep her out of the spotlight until she is old enough to make the decision about whether to speak publicly about her father.
"My child deserves a chance at anonymity," she said. But normalcy is tougher. People follow them down the aisle at Costco to ask questions about the case or to steal a peek at what's in their cart.
"That's not normal for a five-year-old," Bosma said. Her daughter also recently decided that she wants a little sister, and got angry when her mother told her that can't really happen right now.
A shoulder to lean on
Her daughter looks like Tim, but has her mother's fiery attitude. Luckily, she has an extended support system in the Bosma family, who are unyieldingly positive people.
Each day at court, no matter how gruesome the testimony, friends and family sat there next to Sharlene and Bosma's parents, Hank and Mary. They provided a shoulder to lean on. They brought food, and a kind smile. They were the bedrock holding her up.
Sharlene says that's "all part of being a church community."
"This is how we grew up. It's who we are."
She doesn't blame God for what happened. "I know Tim was a good person. I know where he is, now. And that's a comfort."
But when the last three years of your life revolve around grieving and court appearances, what do you do now? What happens when there's no next court date to go to?
"I'm going to try to find my carrots in the garden," Sharlene said, with a smile.
"There are so many weeds back there."
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