Riverdale’s Ryan Grantham
Last March, Riverdale actor Ryan Grantham pleaded guilty to murdering his mother, Barbara Waite, by shooting while the 64-year-old woman was playing the piano at her home in Squamish, Canada.
The 24-year-old was sentenced to life imprisonment for murder by the British Columbia Supreme Court this week after the long-awaited trial, which revealed macabre and startling details.
Ryan Grantham in the 2016 film Conking Love and Other Magic | imdb.com
As from E! published, the verdict considers the possibility of enjoying the parole regime after serving at least 14 years in prison. The court also ordered a lifetime gun ban. Both a life sentence and a gun ban are mandatory for those convicted of second-degree murder in British Columbia, where the trial took place.
Ryan Grantham
After the verdict broke, the actor’s attorney, Chris Johnson, told the media that his client “worked very hard to turn his life around” after he was arrested for his mother’s murder.
“He received a lot of psychological help and felt bad about his actions and confronted them,” the attorney said in a statement. He added, “But he hopes he can spend the rest of his life making amends.”
Ryan Grantham plotted to kill Justin Trudeau
Details of the grisly case kept Americans on edge. Within the first few hours of the first session, the court heard the actor admit to having rehearsed the murder and shortly thereafter even claiming to have videotaped it. In these evidence images he talks about the shooting of Barbara White and shows her body.
He also provided an unusual reason to justify his mother’s cold-blooded murder. “He didn’t want her to see the violent act he was about to commit.” After the young man murdered her, he went in search of a second victim. Armed with three pistols, ammunition, Molotov cocktails, camping supplies and a map with directions, he headed to Canada’s east with the idea of ending Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s life.
As CBC was able to reconstruct, Grantham left Squamish with her body in the vehicle the day after his mother’s murder. Before leaving the crime scene, he tested one of the high-explosive bombs at his disposal. The journey was long. He drove an estimated 50 hours.
Ryan Grantham in a scene from Riverdale | imdb.com
He moved on to Hope County, where he paused to think. There he made the decision not to continue his “mission” and to change his route: Now he planned mass violence on the Lions Gate Bridge in Vancouver or at Simon Fraser University, where he studies.
However, he changed his plans again. Perhaps moved by guilt or exhaustion, he went to the Vancouver Police Department and confessed to his crime: “I killed my mother,” he told an officer.
possible disruption
In the middle of the trial, prosecutor Michaela Donnelly presented two psychiatric reports on the mental health of the young man who played Jeffrey Augustine on Riverdale. Both reports agreed that Grantham was going through an intense period of clinical depression. The possibility was considered that the young man had experienced violent impulses and persistent suicidal thoughts before the killing. A possible marijuana use disorder has also been identified.
“Ryan’s motives for killing his mother might seem altruistic,” Donnelly pointed out, later clarifying that Barbara White had cancer. “However, Mr. Grantham wanted to protect his mother from something he was about to do. That’s different from altruism,” he mused next.
In this vein, he insisted that what the young man committed was nothing more than a “heartbreaking breach of trust” because “it was a mother who loved her son very much and had no reason to fear him “.
Only on the last day of the trial did the accused reveal what he felt for his mother: “I cannot explain or justify my actions. I have no excuse It hurts me to think how much I’ve wasted my life. In the face of something so terrible, it seems so pointless to ask for forgiveness. But I can feel it from every fiber of my being. If I ever get out of prison one day, I hope to continue on this path of improvement,” he said.
*The Grupo de Diarios América (GDA), of which El Nacional is a part, is a leading media network founded in 1991 that promotes democratic values, an independent press and freedom of expression in Latin America through quality journalism for our audiences.
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