Victims' families mark sombre anniversary of grisly N.B. murders

Verna Decarie and Fred Fulton were murdered by Gregory Allan Despres on April 23, 2005.

Thursday brought a sombre anniversary to a quiet New Brunswick community, and to two families shaken by gruesome murders.

It’s been 10 years since Fred Fulton and Verna Decarie were killed in the village of Minto, N.B., east of Fredericton.

Police quickly zeroed in on one suspect, their neighbour Gregory Allan Despres, and an international manhunt began after he fled to the U.S.

It was on April 23, 2005 that Despres took their lives, though that wouldn’t become known until two days later.

The significance of the date is not lost on Michael Richardson, Fulton’s nephew.

“This is the date that everything happened,” he said.

He says, for the Fulton and Decarie families, the anniversary is a day for remembering the good times, both before and after the traumatic events.

"It's nice to be able to think of them and what they meant to us, so today's an important day for us,” Richardson said.

An annual benefit concert has established a legacy for Fulton and Decarie, he said.

“The schools get equipment, musical equipment, there's been donations to the resource centres on behalf of Verna, because that was very close to Verna's heart,” Richardson said.

“So, you know, everything's positive. You've got to take a positive out of a negative and don't let it consume you,” he said.

After fleeing south of the border, Despres was returned to Canada, tried and convicted of the murders.

He was found not criminally responsible due to mental illness.

Gary DiPaolo was the mayor of Minto at the time of the killings, and lived not far from the scene of the crime.

“You know, I just couldn't believe that such an event had happened in our small community,” DiPaolo said.

He says a decade later, people remember.

“People are a bit more cautious than they would've been in the past and there are probably a few more doors locked than were at that time,” he said.

“I think people still feel a sense of loss over the two people.”

With files from CTV Atlantic’s Andy Campbell