More than two decades after the brutal killing of a great-grandfather at a lonely highway rest stop in northern British Columbia, an American man has been extradited to Canada to face justice.
James Daniel Morgan, who is currently serving time for a separate killing in the U.S., appeared in a B.C. courtroom for the first time on Friday to enter a guilty plea.
In Canada, he’s charged with the first-degree murder of 74-year-old James Hamrick.
Hamrick was bludgeoned to death with two hammers outside his camper while on a road trip through Canada in September 2001. He had offered Morgan a ride when he saw him hitchhiking, according to investigators.
Now, Hamrick’s alleged killer has been extradited from a prison in the United States and flown by RCMP officers to northern B.C.
He appeared Friday morning in B.C. Supreme Court in Prince George. Wearing red prison garb, with handcuffs on his wrists and ankles, Morgan was brought into court in a wheelchair.
His defence lawyer and the Crown then presented the judge with a plea deal. Standing up in the prisoner’s box, Morgan pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder, but guilty to the lesser offence of manslaughter.
The deal would credit Morgan for time served in the U.S., where he is currently serving a 48-year sentence for an earlier murder in Colorado.
In court Friday, Crown and defence lawyers asked the judge to sentence Morgan to one day in prison in Canada for the killing of Hamrick. Morgan would then be returned to the U.S. to serve out his sentence, where he will be eligible to apply for parole.
CBC News has reviewed numerous court documents from the U.S. and Canada, dating back to 2001, including a pathology report and transcripts of RCMP and FBI interviews with Morgan in which he confesses to two murders.
CBC News also reviewed documents and affidavits requesting Morgan’s extradition, including material from the Canadian embassy and American Foreign Service. One document was signed by then-U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Some of the details of the police investigation into Hamrick’s killing were presented in court Friday in a joint submission, with Morgan’s defence lawyer reading portions of his client’s confession to RCMP.
The documents reviewed by CBC News paint a more detailed picture of a complex case that spans almost 25 years, connecting two different murder victims, both older men, who were killed in two different countries, almost a decade apart.
Investigators determined that Hamrick, an American, left Alaska on Sept. 8, 2001, in his camper, to drive to his daughter’s home in Arizona for back surgery. Near Tok, Alaska, he felt sorry for a man he saw hitchhiking on a cold, rainy day, and offered Morgan a ride.
The two men travelled south through the Yukon and northern B.C., at one point stopping to visit friends of Hamrick’s in Stewart, B.C. Morgan later told investigators he stole a hammer from that home.
A gas station attendant in Smithers, B.C., told police that Hamrick mentioned to her that he was unhappy travelling with Morgan and would ask him to leave.
On Sept. 10, the men stopped at the Woodpecker highway rest area, in a forest about 40 kilometres south of Prince George, B.C.
Morgan described his attack on Hamrick there in detail during a 2002 interview with RCMP, according to a police transcript.
He told police he sprayed Hamrick in the face with a full can of mace, beat his head repeatedly with two hammers, ran him over with his truck and strangled him with a bungee cord.
In the interview with police, Morgan described his victim, a senior citizen, as a powerful man who was fighting back, so Morgan went back into the truck to look “for something else that I could use. You know, just murder him … and be done with it.”
Bloody dentures and glasses were later found at the scene.
“I can imagine the pain that he … was in,” Morgan told RCMP. “He said, ‘Why are you doing this?’.… I didn’t have the courage to say anything to him.”
According to a transcript of the RCMP interview, Morgan then robbed Hamrick, stealing money, a ring and other items from his pockets, before fleeing the scene in Hamrick’s truck and camper.
The truck and camper were later found abandoned. Hamrick’s poodle, Muffy, was found alive.
Hamrick’s obituary in the Arizona Republic newspaper stated that he was “murdered … by a hitchhiker.” He was survived by five children and step-children, 20 grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.
The violent crime made headlines at the time and triggered fear among travellers in northern B.C. in 2001, but was quickly overshadowed by the attacks on the World Trade Center, which occurred the day after.
By the time Morgan became a suspect in Hamrick’s murder, he had already travelled to the U.S. He was taken into custody after police picked him up for a minor violation. RCMP investigators then flew to the U.S. to interview him.
Morgan confessed to killing Hamrick, telling RCMP investigators, “I’ve cried and cried over it. I’ve prayed and prayed over it … but I get the impression the only way the Lord is ever goin’ to speak to me is if I come straight and confess.”
Morgan told the investigators he had also committed another murder, an unsolved homicide in Denver, Colo., in July 1992.
“I stabbed him in the neck,” Morgan said. “… it was by and large a sexual crime. Before I left, I put a sheet over his head and put his tie around like a noose.”
In 2004, Morgan was sentenced to 48 years in jail after pleading guilty to that 1992 slaying.
His victim was Benjamin Zesch, aged 61. Zesch was visiting friends and relatives in Denver when he was stabbed to death in a motel room that showed signs of struggle. His pickup truck was stolen and later found abandoned in New Mexico.
The crime was part of a wave of stabbings of gay men in the area at the time that raised fears in Denver’s gay community.
News articles following Zesch’s death said police were investigating links between his killing and the stabbing of another man — Robert Farrell — in his apartment less than two months later. But Farrell’s death remains unsolved, according to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation’s cold case files website.
Morgan has never been charged in his case.
In court on Friday, Hamrick’s daughter, Candyce Tracy, gave an emotional victim impact statement by video link, breaking down into tears as she spoke.
She said her family is suffering with profound trauma, recurring nightmares, severe anxiety and serious stress-related illnesses. She said the loss of her father “changed who I am and the life we were supposed to have.”
Tracy said it has been excruciating to wait decades for justice, noting her father’s belongings and treasured keepsakes that were with him when he was killed are still being held by officials as evidence, after more than 24 years.
Morgan stood up hunched over in the prisoner’s box to apologize. He cried as he said, “I’m so sorry, I wish I hadn’t.”
If Morgan serves out his full sentence in Colorado, he’ll be 90 years old when he is released.
