Perriard gets no chance of parole for 13 years

Keegan Periard wishes he had not been at 101 Chapple Avenue on Monday January 5, 2009.

Today, Periard was sentenced to life imprisonment in a federal penitentiary, with no chance of parole for 13 years, for the brutal knife slaying of 58-year-old Joseph Charles Reed.

Reed was stabbed and slashed about 300 times at the victim's apartment some time between January 3 and 5.

Speaking for his client today, defence attorney Bruce Willson said Periard is remorseful about the events of that time period.

As reported earlier by SooToday.com. Periard pleaded guilty to the charge of second-degree murder.

In his decision today, Superior Court Justice Ian McMillan accepted a plea bargain that will allow the 21-year-old Periard to be eligible for parole in 13 years.

McMillan said he felt that sentence was both within the boundary of time served as set by precedent and a sentence that did not bring the court into ill repute.

Willson agreed, saying justice was well served by the decision.

The mandatory sentencing range for second-degree murder in Canada is life imprisonment with anywhere from 10 to 25 years until a convicted offender is eligible to apply for parole. In his decision today, Judge McMillan said he personally would have probably gone for more than 13 years but was satisfied that the suggested sentence jointly submitted by the Crown and defence was in the public interest. The judge said the biggest issue he dealt with in determining an appropriate sentence was with discrepancies between what Periard told police and what he said to forensic psychiatrist Dr. Gary Chaimowitz about events between January 3 and 5, 2009 and the background leading up to those events. Crown Attorney Bill Johnson said he spoke with members of the victim’s family today and advised them of the submissions he would be making in terms of Periard’s sentence before he made those submissions. "They understood all the factors that went into play in that decision," Johnson said. "They understood that that was within the range of an appropriate sentence." Periard turned himself into police at the downtown Greyhound bus terminal after calling 911 from a pay phone there shortly after 2 a.m., confessing he killed Joe Reed. Reed was discovered by police lying face up in his bathroom in a large pool of blood. He had suffered nearly 300 stab, slash and cut wounds to his face, thorax, and abdomen and a black-handled knife was found penetrating his heart. One long, deep slash to Reed's abdomen had eviscerated him and his genitals were mutilated. In a written statement to police, Periard said Reed had tried to touch his genitals and this caused Periard to fly into an uncontrollable rage. “I killed Joe Reed, stabbed him in the chest, sliced open his stomach because he tried to go down my pants," he said in his statement. "Diddlers don't deserve to be alive. He's a goof, he doesn't deserve to be alive." In 2001 Reed served eight months in prison after pleading guilty to sex offenses involving young boys.