Canadian True Crime - The Murder of Robin Greene [2]

Episode Date: June 2, 2021

[Part 2 of 2] The court hears testimony from Sydney Teerhuise and Dan Zupansky, the jury decides whether Sydney Teerhuise had intent to commit murder that day, and Dan Zupansky tells us what his theories are about the case.Look out for early, ad-free release on CTC premium feeds: available on Amazon Music (included with Prime), Apple Podcasts, Patreon and Supercast. Full list of resources, information sources, credits and music credits:See the page for this episode at www.canadiantruecrime.ca/episodes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is part two of a two-part series. If you haven't listened to Part 1 yet, I recommend that you do. It'll make a lot more sense. The trial began in Winnipeg on December 1, 2008. Sydney Tierhus pleaded not guilty to the second-degree murder of Robin Green, which carried a sentence of life in prison with no parole for 10 years. The defence's strategy was to implore the jury to instead find Sydney guilty. of the lesser charge of manslaughter,

which would see him walk away with a shorter jail sentence. Their case was that Sydney couldn't remember murdering Robin because he was so intoxicated, and those letters he wrote were nothing more than fiction, designed to sensationalise the case and sell more books. The prosecution's case was that Sydney befriended Robin at a bar, solicited him for sex, plied him with liquor, and then killed him in the most shocking and cold.

cruel of ways. And as for those letters, they would prove that the details given were real. The court heard testimony from pathologist Dr. Charles Littman, who performed the autopsy on Robin Green's remains. He determined the cause of death to be multiple stab wounds, but because the internal organs had never been recovered, he couldn't determine what the deadliest wound was, the one that caused death. The body had been drained of blood. so they had to collect blood from the muscles to use for the toxicology report. Robin's blood alcohol content at the time of his death was 0.296, nearly four times the legal limit to drive a car,

and his body showed no defence wounds. He was so drunk that he had literally been incapacitated. This is what Sydney had claimed too, that he was so drunk he blacked out and couldn't remember any of what he did to Robin. green. But there was no toxicology report for Sydney to prove it, and Dr. Littman's testimony of what had been done to Robin's body was not consistent with what someone who was blackout drunk would be capable of doing. Dr. Littman testified that there was no evidence of hacking at the

body. The stab wound showed a deliberate symmetrical pattern, and the dismemberment had been executed with a surgical-like precision by someone who had to have had manual dexterity and coordination along with some prior knowledge of human anatomy. He estimated it would have taken two to three hours for Sydney to have done what he did. The court heard testimony from the witnesses who observed him when he turned himself in, as well as the day before. The supervisor of the Raman Center testified about Sydney arriving at about 9.30 in the morning, sounding sober and normal when he spoke, with no smell of liquor coming from him. The police phone operator testified that he sounded calm and direct when he spoke on the phone. And despite the horrific news that he was

delivering, it struck the operator that he spoke as though it was just a routine conversation. The court also heard from the bartender Diane, who served Sydney one beer earlier that afternoon and was the last person to interact with Sydney and Robin before they went to the hotel room. She said she saw Sydney for the final time at around 5pm, which was when he introduced Robin to her as his cousin and left him at the bar to get ice. And while Diane noticed that Robin was clearly intoxicated, swaying and could barely stand up, Sydney seemed completely fine. He didn't appear to be drunk at all. He was walking and talking as though he was sober. And chillingly, this was only about

90 minutes before he said he murdered Robin. Not one person came forward to say that Sydney Tierhus had either been seen drinking large quantities of alcohol or had been seen visibly intoxicated. An American graphic writer and comic called Tom Pomplam testified that Dan Zupanski was not the only one that Sydney was trying to engage with. He had contacted the writer to see if he too might be interested in the gory details, but the writer was not interested and contacted the police. The letters Sydney wrote to Dan Zupanski formed a large part of the trial,

and Dan himself was the star witness. telling the court how his relationship with Sydney started and developed. He established that he did not want to write a book of fiction. He wanted it to be a true crime book, a factual book. He confirmed that his goal was not to get a sensational story that was not true. He wanted the truth. He was asked about one spot in a letter where he wrote to Sydney, quote,

I do not want you to make up things or embellish anything. Keep it realistic, please. Dan testified that it was not his goal to get the most sensational story he could find. He said that he never brought up the necrophilia. It was Sydney who brought it up. On cross-examination, Sydney's defence lawyer Greg Brodsky pointed to the fact that Dan had noted that Sydney may very well be embellishing this story to make for a better book. And he asked Dan if that meant that his book was now a fictional book.

Dan replied, Embellish means exaggerate, doesn't mean fiction. Brodsky also asked questions that gave the impression that Dan was actively trying to ply more information out of Sydney. Quote, give me gory details. Dan maintained that he was just trying to get the truth. Brodsky continued to break down the letters trying to get Dan to admit the book was fiction.

It was pointed out that Dan had often Sidney money for a story. And even though Dan admitted he was aware of that legislation and had no intention of paying, the jury needed to consider how the promise of that money may have impacted the truth of Sydney's story. Did the letters contain the truth of what happened? Was it just fiction to sell more books? Or was it something in the middle? To help the jury with their task, the Crown presented multiple experts, including Dr. Littman, that testified many of the graphic details and procedures Sydney described in the letters matched exactly what was found at autopsy and the crime scene and were things that only the

person who committed the murder would have known. The Crown suggested that this proved Sydney Tierhus acted deliberately and it wasn't just some drunken mistake. Quote, how drunk does a man have to be to do this to another human being? Even though there was no evidence that Sydney was intoxicated at the time. His defense claimed he was suffering from disorganized thinking and impaired judgment and therefore couldn't have formed the intent needed to prove murder. Lawyer Greg Brodsky said, no sane and sober person cuts a body into eight pieces and hides it in a tub. Sydney was described as a chronic alcoholic with a horrid, abusive past. Sydney Teahuees Moore took the state.

stand in his own defense and spoke about his abusive childhood at length, the exact same details he gave to Dan Zupanski. He testified he'd been mixing alcohol and drugs since the age of 16 and had built up a tolerance. He specifically mentioned mixing a high dose of the prescription drug oxycontin with alcohol, which resulted in him blacking out and losing his memory many times before, including the day he murdered Robin Green. That night, he said they both had consumed around the same amount of intoxicants, both alcohol and drugs. He described the quantity they consumed as a substantial amount, from the pitches of beer and shots of scotch at the bar, to drinking more whiskey up in the room, buying more beers, and then smoking three rocks of crack.

He told the court that he blanked out, and when he woke up the next month, he was a little bit of, morning in his hotel room, he smelled an unusual odor in the room, kind of like tin or copper. He described it as sickening. He saw some blood and then walked into the bathroom where he saw Robin's body, obviously deceased. Sydney said he threw up in the toilet and then spent 30 minutes pacing the room, trying to figure out what had happened. After washing his face and getting dressed, he walked to the remand center to turn him

in, thinking it was the police station. Sydney was asked why he showed no emotion when he turned himself into the remand center, nor when he escorted the cops back to the hotel room to show them that what he was talking about was true. He replied that he felt showing emotion at that time was inappropriate, and he added that he was raised to believe that men don't cry. The court heard that he had no idea that the necklace-pillar. belonged to Susan Sarandon. He only found out where it came from when the Winnipeg City

police showed him photos, and even then he didn't recognize the necklace at first. He maintained he was not the one who stole it, although there's never been any physical evidence that it was Robin Green who stole it either. About the details he gave to Dan Zupanski for his book, Sydney confirmed that he saw the autopsy and crime-seem photos on many occasions and took note of all the info he got from the reports, the photos and the layout of the hotel room. He said that he wanted it all to sound accurate, and Dan had asked him for specific information like the layout of the bathroom or where the bed was, and had asked questions about Robin Green's appearance.

Quote, I knew nothing about Mr. Green at all. I had to look at reports to find out how tall he was, how much he weighed. Sydney said he put everything together in rough drafts, and since Dan had emphasized not to embellish it, if something didn't sound real enough, he would edit it over and over to keep it real. He described the whole process as time-consuming. One of the things he claimed was that he heard voices telling him to kill, but on the stand he said it wasn't true. He'd only said that to Dan Zupanski because he'd read some serial killers said they heard voices too.

He also denied that the third person in the room ever existed. He said he made up the details of necrophilia, explaining that as Dan's questions became more elaborate as time went on, he upped the ante on the details he was providing. The grave-digging and cannibalism stories were made up too, he said. He just wanted to give Dan Zupensky the story he wanted to hear. When Sydney was asked why he was trying to sensational, the content of the book by selling untrue stories, he told the court that he wanted to get

famous and get a book deal and a more sensational story would earn more book sales and more profits. He said at that point he was locked up in solitary confinement 23 hours a day, and Dan Zupanski was the only person he had contact with outside the prison. He saw the letters and the drawings as a sick form of entertainment. He said when he looks back, he can't believe some of the things he wrote. In Dan Zupanski's book, he states that Sydney was not in solitary confinement

as he testified. Speaking of that book, Sydney testified that the title Trophy Kill, the Shell We Dance Murder, was his suggestion, and he drew the picture of Robin's torso posed like a trophy to connect it all, but the drawing was

pure fiction. And as for his claims of dumping the organs, he said that was lies too. He had no idea where the organs were because he'd blanked out at the time. Again, he wrote those details because he wanted it to sound like a really vicious act, a good story to sell more books. On cross-examination, Sidney admitted that he wanted the court to believe he was naive and that he was the person being toyed with by Dan Zupanski. He also admitted. that he did want notoriety at one point, but soon realized it could be very damaging, so that's why he retracted many of the details he gave in the letters. During trial, Sydney had multiple outbursts. For example, when a female police officer was

testifying, he called her a derogatory name and the jury heard it. When the prosecution brought it up in court, he gave the excuse that he refused to tolerate someone lying in court. In closing arguments, Crown Prosecutor Sheila Linebird called Sydney Tierhus a cold and calculating murderer, who clearly revels in his own wrongdoing and was unimaginably cruel to the point of inhumanity. Quote, to be able to do what he did to another human being speaks volumes about his character. And as for his claims of blacking out, she said it's impossible for someone to be so intoxicated, that he didn't remember stabbing a man 68 times and cutting up his body with surgical-like precision

over the course of several hours. And even if he did blackout, that didn't negate intent. Sydney's defense lawyer, Greg Brodsky, told the court that Sydney just lost it that day and reminded the jury of his very unhappy background and childhood. While he admitted the crime was horrific, Brodsky asked the jury to leave emotion

out of their deliberations. Quote, You can't decide my client is a horrible person. He told the jury that Sydney didn't have to prove anything. The onus is on the crown to prove that Sydney was guilty of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Sydney's defence failed. The jury found him guilty of second-degree murder. Journalist Mike McIntyre reported extensively on the case for the Winnipeg Free Press

and observed that Sydney showed no emotion as the verdict was read. But as he was being led out of court, he called the prosecutor an obscene name and gave her the finger. That prosecutor, Sheila Linebird, told the media that the letters to Dan Zupansky were likely a big influence on the jury due to their very graphic and detailed nature. She commended the jury for getting through the trial and said they'll be offered trauma counsellors.

to deal with the things they'd seen and heard. Mike McIntyre reported that he observed an unusual sight. Several jurors were seen hugging members of Robin Green's family. This verdict meant an automatic sentence of life in prison, but the jury added a recommendation. Seven of the 12 jurors recommended that Sydney should not be eligible for parole for 25 years, a sentence that's usually reserved for first-degree murder convictions. The other five jurors had no recommendation.

Justice Glenn Joyle ruled that Sydney would have no chance of parole for 25 years. There was nothing banal about what he did. Quote, to have intended these particularly grisly acts is a matter of some significance. I am struck by the purposefulness and precision of his violent acts. The judge pointed out that the existence of the letters and Sydney's desire for fame revealed not only his attempts at self-promotion for financial gain and profit, but also a shocking lack of remorse for ending Robin Green's life in such a horrific way. The judge described the crime as one of the most brutal he could conceive,

and while there may have been some embellishments in Sydney's letters, the judge believed he knew exactly what he had done. And this meant Sydney Tierhus needed to be separated from society as long as possible. With all the overshadowing factors in this case, from the gruesome details to the celebrity angle to the men wanting to cash in on the story, Robin Green, the man who lost his life, has largely been reduced to a character. Newspaper headlines that sensationalised the most awful parts of the case and erased Robin's humerus. upset his family so much that they sent a cease and desist order to the Winnipeg's son. They've rarely spoken to the media.

Family members travelled to attend the trial and deliver victim impact statements at the sentencing hearing. According to the Winnipeg Free Press, Robin's sister Janice said that she was devastated just to learn that the 38-year-old had died. But when she heard the gory details of his demise, quote, I was never to be the same again. I fell apart. His death made me question life, my creator, and my spiritual being. She said that she agonized over the fact that Robin was killed while he came to visit her in Winnipeg that weekend.

Their father, elder Robin Green Sr., said that having to relive his son's death through the trial was incredibly difficult. Sydney Tierhuis appealed his conviction. on the grounds that the judge made mistakes and instructing the jury to pay attention to those letters. According to CBC News, he apologized for being late with some documents he needed in preparation for the appeal hearing.

He said that he was suffering from liver disease, recovering from a flesh-eating disease, and was wheelchair-bound. In May of 2010, his appeal was dismissed on all grounds. Sydney Tierhus will be eligible for parole in July of 2008. He'll be 59 years old. At around the same time as that appeal, Dan Zupansky released the book that he was writing on the case. Trophy Kill, the Shall We Dance Murder, the trial and revelations of a psychopathic killer.

The book is described as horrific but thorough and includes all of Sydney's graphic letters and pictures The book lays out all the evidence like a jigsaw puzzle, specifically letting the court transcripts of witness testimony speak for themselves. After everything that's happened, Dan stepped back and took a look at all the evidence and he realized that a likely motive for the murder may have been hiding in plain sight all along, and he believed it all came down to that necklace. I was intrigued, so I reached out to Dan to find out if he'd be interested in, in chatting about this and answering some of my questions, and he graciously agreed.

He still has a lot to say about this case. Dan has been questioned about his methods and decisions many times before, and I incorporated his responses into the episode. What I'll be asking him are the questions I've been left with, just from a curiosity perspective. Now, Dan Zupanski started his podcast, True Murder, in 2010, at around the same time as his book Trophy Kill was published, and he continues to release weekly episodes of the podcast. You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking killers in true crime history, and the authors that have written about them. Gacy, Bundy, Domer, The Nightstocker, BTK.

Every week, another fascinating author talking about, the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True murder with your host, journalist and author, Dan Zupanski. So it's my pleasure to welcome Dan Zupanski from Winnipeg. Dan, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you very much, Christy. So we're just going to get right into it. So you've developed a theory that the Susan Sarandon necklace was the motive for the brutal murder of Robin Green. But my question is, Sydney always said that he didn't find out that the necklace was from that movie set until a police officer told him after he'd been arrested for the murder.

So I'd love to know a bit more about your theory, specifically how you came to that conclusion. Well, here's the thing that, you know, putting a bunch of inferences together and thinking about this and working on the case for waiting for the case for five and a half years to come to trial. I came to conclusions based on all my research and all of the things that, he had written to me, alluded to me, intimated, insinuated, and hinted at. So what I realize is that Sidney certainly was a movie fan. When he met Robin Green that day and he claims that there was jewelry, that Green was trying to sell him, I have no evidence other than to believe him in that regard. So let's assume that he was a proposition and said, do you want to buy this jewelry,

took a look at the jewelry, assumed it was women's jewelry. They went back to his hotel, and later on they left that hotel, and they went towards a park, which just happened to be not far down from where the Shall We Dance movie was shooting some outdoor location, shots. Now, I don't know, absolutely, if they had a conversation, but I believe that they had a conversation about that jewelry, where it came from, and Sydney at some point realized and hatched a plan to kill this person in such a sensational way, because he knew they would have that jewelry there to ensure what he believed would be certain fame with having the the jewelry, connected with an incredibly sensational murder, a very unique murder.

What's left out of the reports is also the description of the body in the bathtub that day is very, very, very important to this, the idea, my theory that he's a serial killer, and that it was this end of his series, and why? I will definitely get to the serial killer theory in a second, but I just want to clarify what you just said. So, Sydney insists that he didn't know about the necklace until days after he murdered Robin, but your theory is that Sydney did in fact know about the necklace and decided that he could use it to get fame and notoriety, but he also knew what the penalties were for first and second degree murder regarding intent and decided that if he pretended like he blanked out and had no idea where the necklace came from,

he could get off with manslaughter. Is that a decent characterization of your theory? Yes, and he knew roughly from what he had written me that he wanted to be out for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, and that would have been seven years from the time that he was arrested for the murder of Robin Green. So he knew that typically a manslaughter was about 10 years, and he could be out in about seven years if this could be depicted as a manslaughter. And like I said, in that one year of correspondence, where he could have told me anything, he could have told me he was innocent. He could have told me, yes, hard to believe, but I really don't remember what happened.

But instead, he told me this horrifying tale of how much he enjoyed each and every graphic detail of, this surgical-like autopsy of a human being, exploration, disposal of all the organs, and then displaying this person in a murder horror spectacle for maximum shock value. If we are to move on to the serial killer angle, so Sydney told you that he was questioned by the police for other similar crimes, specifically in Vancouver and Edmonton, where he'd been working as a chef. And from this, you've developed a theory that he has murdered before. And this was kind of touched on at the trial because the forensic pathologist testified

that the person responsible for Robin's murder seemed to have a prior knowledge of human anatomy, but that was the only evidence presented on the specific kind of angle of a serial killer. And then in the book it says, Sydney told you that when he kept denying to the police about these other murders and dismemberments, eventually a police officer gave up and decided that he must have murdered them all. So are you able to give us any more information on these murders, whether they're still unsolved or if you still think he was responsible? Well, following this, I always had the idea that he was a serial killer and I tried to follow up to try to find unsolved murders in places where he had been, Vancouver.

It didn't make sense for me, for him to always have dreamed of going out to Vancouver, the very liberal Vancouver in many ways. He had mentioned it. It was his dream place to live and work. For him to then move to Alberta seemed odd, and then for him to then move to Canora suddenly, and then be back in Winnipeg seemed odd in itself. In terms of the unsolved murders the way he described,

I thought about it for a while and then realized that's ridiculous. I did research. Obviously, there are no other cases, let alone in Canada, let alone anywhere, where there would be a similar, even remotely similar type victims left at a crime scene. However, when I say about intimating, insinuating, hinting at, directing me to, his heroes were incredible serial killers, not only that they were infamous, but they were also, one of their characteristics was that they, except for Aline Wernos, he said, Gacy, Dahmer, and Nilsson were his heroes. So what was it about those three killers that he admired was part of it is that they destroyed. their victims. They were able to, in fact, get rid of any victims. There were no crime scenes

left for the victims of those three killers. They were all killers that killed homosexuals, and that was, again, an aspect of Sidney Tierhus. He talked about his victims, and he mentioned that Robin Green wasn't his ultimate victim. Those were his words. And he talked about vulnerable people that he could pick up at a bus station or at one of these, again, hardcore bars, I guess, people that wouldn't get so noticed if they went missing. So he talked about all those things, and it made no sense for all the time that I worked on this case. It made no sense for somebody to have serial killers as heroes, and then for them to have the capacity and the capability that he certainly had with this one murder, to then not pursue this, to have a plan that did not include continuing as serial killers would. Somebody that would enjoy these aspects of it, it seemed incredibly peculiar that he would have stopped at this one murder and then insiniscuous. intimated and hinted at other murders. He taught in his language when you kill someone,

when you do this, when the body dies. I mean, he did everything but admit and I believe it would be a part of the incredible revenge on society. No, never mind revenge on his adoptive family, but revenge on society to be able to have this over everyone, this I committed murder. I'm likely a serial killer. I have all, I fit the profile better than anyone has ever fit a serial killer profile. That's certain. And I did a few years in prison. I'm famous and I'm going to make some money. So if Sydney was allegedly a serial killer and had gotten away with his previous murders, why do you think he decided to turn himself in for this one? I think that once he realized he had this opportunity to become famous,

he realized that with that jewelry that it would ensure fame, in his mind. He's somewhat delusional, but in his mind, Susan Sarandon, Jennifer Lopez, Richard Gear, right on the backs of Chicago, a Miramax movie. This was a big deal in Winnipeg. You know, Winnipeg is a big movie-making city, comparatively in North America, but this is still pretty big for Winnipeg. And it was on all the news. And so regardless if he's living in a low-budget hotel room, he is seeing the fear that's going on in Winnipeg.

Richard Gere's limo would have been parked right next door to the bar that Robert Green and Sidney Tearhus met at. Every night at the dance studio right next door to that bar, which is about 100 yards away from the Royal Albert Hotel where Sydney Teirhuis rented the room. And he's a movie fan. he's a self-avowed movie fan. So some of the three biggest movie stars in the world at that time were in Winnipeg, and he realized that this jewelry was going to ensure him infamy in the things that he was interested, which was murder and movies. So why come forward?

Because he knew that he could do a few years in prison. He was at the end of the road. He was always losing employment. He was back where he wanted to. to leave. And he went and wrote in the letters where he went back to his old address and back down bad memory lane and thought about all the rejection. He really, he said he had no connection to any of the, this adoptive family anymore.

He certainly had no connection to his bio family. So he had no one and he was back in a dead end in a, in a flop house. He was at the end of the road. He could talk about having money for alcohol, and he talked in the trial. He was taking oxy cotton. He was smoking some crack, smoking some weed, drinking all kinds of alcohol. But he really was at his wits end. You know, he was almost unemployable, and he was back in a flop house in downtown Winnipeg

and blazing heat and in a hotel. But he knew he had this jewelry, and he also knew he had revenge for his own. adopted family because on July 2nd was the day he was adopted into this family, into this what he claimed was abusive family. So Robin was killed on July the 1st and Sydney turned himself in the next day, July the 2nd, which was reportedly also the anniversary of his adoption into the Tierhue's family when he was three. So you definitely think the date also played a role? Absolutely. I mean, it can't be coincidence. And he made a sure that he pointed that out to me. He wanted somebody to do a little bit of thinking. He's an

intelligent guy and he wanted somebody to work a little bit. I mean, he's going to, he told me all the details. He gave me all of all the particulars because he wanted to share it with someone. I know on the stand, Sidney tried to infer that you pleaded with him for gory details and after a while he just gave in and gave you what you wanted. This is what I said to him. I didn't goad him. I didn't prompt him. I said after about nine months of stuff about his family, some of it exaggerated, his importance as a chef, likely some of it exaggerated.

You know, we had all of his background. We had many things that were components of a book, I believed. But after nine months, I said, listen, I need, the publisher wants to know details of the day in question, the night in question, that you claim to not remember. That's it. That's not constantly pleading for gory graphic details. That's not what that is. And then in the next three months came a flood of information where he reveled, absolutely reveled, in the crime, the murder, said it was a reasonable sacrifice, this person, that he treated him like a side of beef. He enjoyed the organ removal, the virtual autopsy. He had fun. He paced it out. It was sexual for him. And then there was necrophilia. And all the enjoyment, the description of the incredible feeling he had. And then again, the disposal of the organs miles and miles away after carefully, and this is the pathologist, surgical-like removal. Those letters were used

for detail by detail to say, yes, that with the pathologist, this corresponds with what is true. And he could not have that from reading anatomy books. The smell, the squishiness of certain organs, description. And that's why there's all those pages of transcripts, which people go, people say, I hate transcripts. There are transcripts that are quite boring, I would imagine. I mean, and I think that I could have done further editing, I think, and people have pointed that out. But I think a lot of the testimony, my testimony, on the Stanford Day, Sydney's testimony, and the pathologist testimony, those are very crucial testimonies to hear. and to be able. It's rare for a defendant to take the stand. And I had the unique position of having

conversations and detailing those conversations with the prosecutor. Unbeknownst to the defense attorney, I interviewed the defense attorney. Yeah, I was going to ask you about that, because the transcript of that interview was also in the book. And I read it with some interest. And I wanted to know, like, why did you decide to interview him? The purpose was I wanted to ask him. I wanted to establish his philosophy. I wanted to know, and I didn't refer to this, to the case that I was involved in, so unbeknownst to him, I was dealing with his client. But I wanted to know how he dealt with the cornerstone of the judicial system, as it's been described, the idea that you were not to lie for your client or have your client lie on the stand. So I wanted to interview him to establish that

I think what I was doing with the book, as you can see, is that I was making predictions. I was asking people, well, what will he do? How does a murder case actually work? Because I had a lot of time in between me coming forward with the information after a year of corresponding with Sydney. What I did in the interview was ask him this basic question. If you're not to lie for your client or have your client lie in the stand, how do you determine the truth?

And then like you say, very colorfully, he said, well, what do I care about the truth? This is not a church. He says, what do you want me to do? Run up to the judge. You go, honor, your honor, my client's guilty. Well, I said, well, what if he tells you more than one story? He says, well, they all do that. He says, they can tell me four or five different stories.

And I go, well, then you just go to, you go to court with that? He goes, oh, no, of course not. Well, I go, well, then what's the standard, you know, what's the standard, basically? you know, and you can't pin this person down. He says, well, there's five different stories. And why I did that is to get that one gem. How do you determine the truth? You're not to lie for your client or have your client lie. And I also interview a former Crown Attorney. And I said, well, how does a lawyer do it? He says, well, this is what you do. You go in there and you say, shut up, don't say anything. Here's what they know. Now think about it and tell me what happened.

And he says, if the client is halfway smart, they'll figure it out. And, well, there you have it. So it's the way around the fundamental cornerstone of the judicial system. This guy says, well, I don't care what the truth is. So then we, I knew that would be valuable. Then later, when we go to trial, we see there's no way on earth. He doesn't know the truth. And he says, in fact, the lawyer, that the only reason his client knows these details that he gave to me was because they went and visited them at prison, brought the discovery, which was the autopsy photos, the crime scene photos, the police reports, and they brought it out constantly, at least once a week they claim that that's what they do with their client, once a week,

and that he took notes, and eventually they saw, well, hey, wait a minute, what's he doing? He's taking notes, but oops, we kind of did that. We kind of gave him all that. information. And then you think, really, you're bringing autopsy photos out every week for a guy to look at and crime scene photos? I just wanted to find out what was your personal opinion of Sydney? Like, I know that you met with him a couple of times and had a bunch of phone calls, but most of your correspondence was via letters, which came primarily from his side. What do you think of Sydney? Well, the thing is, what I think of him is only as a subject for this book. I mean, I didn't befriend him.

It wasn't my intention, and it couldn't have been possible. I can't believe the crime that he committed. And so I went there with him as this oddity, this sociopath, this unique killer. And certainly I saw it as a unique. journalistic opportunity and experience. It was the most unforgettable and bizarre year of correspondence. It was hard to assess what I was feeling, getting that information. Being excited as a journalist with an opportunity, yet having to correspond.

with someone like this, giving me this kind of information. I mean, I was open to the opportunity, but it took a toll, psychological toll. And I bet it was quite stressful. I read at one point you were concerned for your safety. Was it in the lead-up to the trial? You know, the thing is, I always said that after this trial, which he received the pretty well unprecedented, 25 years before parole eligibility, whereas that's the maximum sentence for first-degree murder under any conditions in Canada versus the manslaughter. So instead of him possibly getting out in, say, he did get the manslaughter, typical manslaughter, 10 years, and he was out in seven.

Well, he had already done five and a half years in custody. He had been out in about 18 months with no supervision. and he might have thought, geez, this guy betrayed me or ripped me off. I think that was a thing. I think this guy stole from me. And I knew what his capabilities were. So, I mean, and I might have played up the actual danger I felt. But I think it's real.

He said at trial that he hated me. I think that's a very rational fear. Now, when it came to the book, which ended up being titled Trophy Kill, the Shall We Dance Murder, I know that that was one of Sydney's choices for title. And personally, I would have changed the title just so that he wouldn't be pleased. But the elephant in the room is that I'm also covering this case, knowing that he might be pleased about that. But anyway, you said at the trial that you didn't know why he wanted you to call the book Trophy Kill. And you kept asking him, but he wouldn't tell you.

And then in the end, you decided that it was the most appropriate name for the book. So I just wanted to know a little bit more about that. Well, you know, he said, this is Robin Green, dismembered, disarticulated, and disemboweled, and this is my creation, my trophy. So I asked him, why would you, why do you think he was a human trophy? But trophy kill is like the guy that goes out somewhere and pays to shoot an animal. And this trophy kill, to him, I guess, I believe, when he believed it was the ideal title, was just the idea that he killed to be famous, that he had the ability to kill anybody,

and he chose this opportunity. There is never been any crime scene, not Jack the Ripper, not anybody. I've done the research. Not anybody did a crime scene, made a display, and then you say, well, why do you think he's a serial killer? because even the most exclusive serial killers have never done this. The capability of then walking into what he believes is a police station nonchalantly. They thought, this guy must be kidding.

They walked into the hallway. He was only a few feet away. He could see everybody's reaction. This room was tiny. I mean, there was nothing to the room. And so that's what people got to see. And that's what he knew those people were getting. had to see. They said, well, we think this guy might be kidding because he's too calm, because

this is not the kind of guy you see every day, even in Murder Capital, Winnipeg. So are you still searching for answers and the truth to this case? Like now that more time has elapsed, what do you think? What's left on your mind or have you completely moved on? Well, I never quite move on, and I've done some research after I had a, fellow journalist to contact him about a possible serial killer documentary that she was going to produce. And she has written various true crime, nonfiction books about serial killers. And he agreed, despite first saying, well, I'm not a serial killer. And she said, yeah, but you fit all the characteristics. So he was interested in that. And then that

correspondence broke off. His parole hearing is in seven years. So, what I am going to do is that I need to be at that parole hearing in 25 years, because part of my philosophy is that this killer, like many killers, should never be released from prison, and especially this killer here, should never be released from prison. And I know that's sort of a novel idea in Canada, thinking that a certain amount of years constitutes rehabilitation. Or there are some programs in prison that, you know, you and I are not aware of that would ensure or address rehabilitation of this kind of killer considering the circumstances of this murder. In less than seven years, to petition to have status at this trial because of his reported

hatred of me and, as I explained, my fear that he could want to have some retroactive over what he believes is a money owed or betrayal or that I got him 25 years to life. Like I know that he said, you know, he changed his mind and he felt like the things he'd said were damaging and that's why he was saying that it was all lies even though Robin's body had been found in the same way that it had been found. But like, do you think that he is genuinely remorseful for this? or that he has the potential to show remorse? Or do you think that he was only saying that he had turned back

because he'd been caught, I guess, because things backfired? Oh, it's only because he believed that now I was ripping him off and that I certainly would go to the authorities with the information. He thought, oh, yeah, the guy just said that. I never heard that. See, he didn't believe that the law had actually changed. You said, I never read anything like that. You're just trying to rip me off.

And so I guess he believed in the rip-off that I would go to the authorities instantly with this information. I don't know why he assumed one was connected to the other. And so then he retracted certain things and tried to discourage me from going on. But again, like I say, I was confident that the information he gave me was actually. accurate, was factual, and I was totally vindicated at trial by, again, the forensic pathologist, confirming then the jury believing the letters, believing the pathologist, believing my testimony. You know, when you look at this in the beginning and the reporting, it's like they were excited to have me as a journalist come forward and then realize, wow, look at the evidence that this

guy was able to obtain from the killer himself, and this evidence is being used from day one at this three-week trial to prove this case. And like without this evidence, the prosecution doesn't have a case, which I think is just demonstrative of how, what kind of an incredible standard we seem to have in Canada here to prove guilt. If I were not to be involved in this case, where Sydney hadn't wanted to tell me every single graphic detail of a tale that really defies his claim that he was drunk and he couldn't remember. I think it's ridiculous, and I think that's why the book is important for Canadians to read rather than Americans. Even though the crime was absolutely horrific, you're critical that the press still didn't give it the attention that it deserved, even with the celebrity angle, and you've suggested that it's because both men were indigenous and gay,

and there was alcohol and drugs and a low-rent motel involved. This case, without my involvement, would have went away. Like you say, when you look at the summaries of this, you have no idea of the magnitude of this crime. You don't. And so, like I posed to a journalist in Winnipeg, I said, imagine. if it were a white woman found in a hotel bathtub where their sexual organs removed, decapitated, her organs removed, and posed and displayed. You think then it would have been national news?

I didn't even hear about this. I mean, it's just, it's downplayed because it was just a couple natives. Drunk natives, homosexual, not important. And it was ready to be swept under the rug, but what's really the real injustice would have been the victim, the killer would have got a manslaughter conviction out of this and been laughing the whole seven years he would have been in prison. So what's next for you, Dan? I know that you're definitely still releasing weekly episodes of true murder, but do you

have any plans to write any more books, anything in the works? Well, I have a, I'm a procrastinator, but I'm also been involved for about three or four years with another, well, a case that's really close to my heart about a person that was abducted on Halloween in 1984 named Scott Dove. And this was in Thunder Bay, Ontario. And this case, he was abducted for a month and then found, murdered a month later. And so I did all. of the preliminary research. And unfortunately, as you may know in Canada, there is not the kind of cooperation that my American author friends receive in the U.S. lots of times there are detectives that are given case files, police reports. I've interviewed prosecutors, judges, detectives. So there seems to be in Canada a lot of ways to jam you up and not be able to get the kinds of information you need to write a complete book. So I'm still working on the Scott Dove Cold Case

book presently. So anything other than that, I don't have any other plans for any other books. Because I, in Canada, because of that same reason, I think you really do have to have a unique access to some information before you can really write a book. So again, it's just a matter of access, I believe, that sometimes in Canada we just don't really have prosecutors and police that are really open to giving up files and telling you what was going on in what's always an ongoing case. Interesting. Well, Dan, thank you so much for taking the time to speak to me, and I wish you all the best with the rest of this year and this project that you have going. Well, thank you so much, and it's been a thrill to be interviewed by you.

and I hope to hear the end product sometime soon. Thank you so much. Thanks for listening and special thanks to Dan Zupanski for giving me his time and also to Haley Gray for research. It's a bit of a head scratcher this one and I'd love to know what you think after listening to the episodes. Look out for the social media posts on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and drop a comment. I promise I will read them all. Canadian True Crime is a completely independent production, funded through average, advertising and the generosity of supporters on Patreon and Supercast. Thank you to everyone who's told a friend or left a positive review wherever you listen to podcasts.

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