30 years later, horror of Wells Gray murders remains

A short news brief in today’s newspapers carries long memories for many here and in the Okanagan Valley. It says that Thursday was the 30th anniversary of the murder of a Westbank family in Wells Gray Provincial Park.

David William Shearing, as he was then known, shot and killed campers George and Edith Bentley and their daughter and son-in-law Jackie and Bob Johnson, and kidnapped the Johnsons’ young daughters Janet and Karen so he could sexually assault them. A few days later, he killed them, too.

I remember the hunt for Shearing, and for the missing girls, and the traumatic discovery of their bodies in a burned-out car. I also remember his trial, held here in the old courthouse, and how skillful RCMP investigators got him to provide details of his awful crimes.

On Sept. 18, David Ennis (Shearing) comes up for another parole hearing in Alberta. It’s his second.

Then-Daily News city editor Susan Duncan travelled to Alberta to cover his first attempt to gain freedom in October 2008. He told the board then that he regretted his “thoughtless” acts, and he apologized.

Reflecting on the experience of having to listen to the terrible story of those murders, and to Ennis insisting he was a changed man, Duncan wrote that “no matter how great his rehabilitation, he can never be allowed to walk outside the walls of a prison again.”

I believe in the concept of rehabilitation, but I agree with Susan that there are exceptions. This new hearing will force families of the victims to go through it all again; the only relief will be if Ennis is once again denied a chance to get out of jail.