Convicted murderer who changed his name dies in B.C. prison

The Mission Institution in Mission, B.C., is seen from the air in 2019. (Pete Cline / CTV News Vancouver)

Warning: This story contains disturbing details.

A convicted murder has died of “apparent natural causes” in a federal prison in B.C.’s Fraser Valley, according to the Correctional Service of Canada.

Ryan Brady died Sunday at Mission Institution, a medium-security prison in Mission, B.C., the CSC said in a news release Tuesday.

At the time of his death, the 59-year-old was serving a life sentence that began on April 1, 1986.

The CSC did not specify the conviction that led to Brady’s sentence, but news reports from 2010 in the Coast Reporter indicate that Brady was known as Darren Kelly at the time of his crimes.

According to the Sunshine Coast newspaper, Brady, né Kelly, abducted a three-year-old girl named Genoa “Genni” May from a motel in Davis Bay in December 1985, while her parents were sleeping just two metres away. He raped and murdered the child, whose body was found along a logging road the following day.

Brady was arrested a week later and pleaded guilty to first-degree murder, receiving an automatic life sentence with no chance of parole for 25 years.

He remained behind bars for the rest of his life.

The CSC said Brady’s next of kin has been notified of his death, and the Correctional Service of Canada will review the circumstances surrounding it, as the service does with all in-custody deaths.