Inside Robert Raymond Cook family murder

It was one of the worst murder cases in Canada’s history – and one that is still debating in Alberta today.

Robert Raymond Cook was executed about 65 years ago after being guilty of killing his father Raymond Cook while he was suspected of murdering his stepmother Daisy Cook and blown his five young half-siblings between 3 and 9 years to death in his sleep.

The 23-year-old convicted murderer was the primary police suspect in all murders, even though he was only tried for his father’s murder in an attempt to speed up the trial, according to Red -deer lawyer. Cook defended himself until his last days, even writing a dramatic poem that proclaimed his innocence, as Vision news revoked in his report on what is considered to be the most notorious murder in Alberta history.

But despite its grounds, Cook was executed on November 15, 1960 and became the last man ever hanged in Alberta. People look back on what led to his execution.

An arrest leads to a horrible discovery

Cook was often in-and-out of prison throughout his life, according to his defense lawyer David Macnaughton, who told Vision news that his client was only in prison 243 days between 14 and 22 years because he was consistently arrested for small crimes as theft.

The newspaper reports that Cook’s family was murdered just days after he was released from serving two years in prison. After his release, Cook was arrested again when he tried to trade with his father Raymond’s car and was accused of falsifying documents. The newspaper reported that the police in the tribe of the vehicle found family documents – including the family members’ birth certificates, his father’s marriage certificate, his sibling report card and a photo album with pictures of Cook’s mother, including family herds.

The police decided to visit Cook’s father to ask him directly about his son’s attempt to replace his car – but when they came to the house, the officers noticed blood throughout the home and could not immediately find the family. Raymond, 53, stepmother Daisy Mae, 37, and Cook’s five half -siblings, Gerald, 9, Patrick, 8, Christopher, 7, Kathy, 5 and Linda Mae, 3, were soon found dead in a mechanic fat pit during the family garage, according to Ponoka News.

The murder for the chef family

The Vision news Reported that Cook was soon accused of murdering his seven family members: Raymond and his wife Daisy were found killed by shotguns, while the children were found dead from being blown by the weapon. Blood was found in the family members’ beds, which led to the investigators believing that the chefs had been killed while sleeping.

Cook was sent to Ponoka Hospital for a 30-day psychiatric assessment after being accused of the murder, but he was not there for a long time. Historical documents from Cook’s trial show that he accommodated the hospital just a few days into his stay and launched one of the largest manhunts in Alberta history. Cook’s escape caused “vast alarm and horror among the inhabitants” in the area “, one Academy of arrest From 1960 reads.

Cook was taken back into custody after a dramatic several days, which included two car chases and worried headings across the country, according to Red -deer lawyer.

A son’s trial and execution

Cook maintained his innocence throughout the trial and even testified that he broke into an Edmonton solemen that night his family was murdered in their home, according to Advocate. But he was found guilty of circumstances, according to the newspaper. Although he won an appeal shortly after, Cook was found guilty a second time and sentenced to death for his father’s murder.

His execution in 1960 was the last hang in Alberta history, according to Canadian legal archives. Cook was never convicted of the six other charges of murder that he faced for the deaths to his stepmother Daisy and her five young children.

For decades ago, Cook’s debt has continued to be discussed among locals, according to Vision newswhose paragraph 2019 on the mass murder includes local population perspectives on the case.

The day before his hanging, the convicted killer wrote a poem in which he blamed a named suspect. “I am sitting here in my death cell, I don’t know why / for the evidence showed me innocent, and it’s no lie,” The poem’s poem begins, according to a copy held in Canadian legal archives.

“So I ask you, it’s strange that I’m sentenced to The Noose / While my family’s murderer is healthy,” Cook repeats all the time.

Many locals still believe that Cook was really innocent and wondering if his family’s “real” murderer had come away by framing the family’s oldest son, according to Vision news. “He may well have done it, but there was doubt,” MacNaughton, Cook’s defense lawyer, told the outlet decades later and admitted, “I’m probably a fence.”