Elmer Battler
Kitchener, ON / July 13, 1945
Elmer Battler, 20, was shot in the back of the head on July 13, 1945, as he sat in his taxi. The killer then drove the taxi to the Kitchener police station and explained that the death was accidental. A coroner's jury returned a verdict of accidental death and no charges were laid.
In the following years the killer became an alcoholic and drug abuser and on three occasions was confined to hospital for psychiatric reasons. Twenty years after Battler's death, in November, 1965, he confessed to his therapist that he had murdered Battler with the intention of robbing him. He later told the same story to a co-worker who, at the killer's request, reported his confession to the London police.
The killer was charged with capital murder but the judge accepted a plea of guilty to non-capital murder. This became the basis of appeal on the grounds that a jury was needed in order to return a verdict of guilty to the lesser charge.
The killer was granted a new trial on the charge of non-capital murder and this time he was found guilty. However, the conviction was appealed on the grounds that the trial judge had, during the voir dire, too severely restricted the scope of testimony by psychiatrists called by the defence. The burden of their testimony was that the accused was susceptible to making false confessions. He now claimed that he had confessed to the crime in order to gain attention.
The appeal was allowed and the killer was granted a third trial. The Crown's application for permission to appeal this decision to the Supreme Court of Canada was denied.
This case provides a strange parallel to the Albert Richer murder (1947). In the Richer case, a man confessed to the murder 25 years after the fact and psychiatric testimony about the susceptibility of the accused to making false confessions was a key factor in his acquittal.
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