Blood 'executioner' gets life

Page 1

One of the two men charged with the March 27, 1988 killing of Blood Indian Bernard Tallman Jr. Was given a life sentence with no chance of parole for 15 years Feb. 24 at Court of Queen's bench in Lethbridge.

Darcy Lee Watmough, 21, of Fort Macleod, changed his earlier plea of not guilty to guilty of first degree murder.

Crown prosecutor Jim Langston told Court of Queen's Bench Justice Clarence Janosik it was Watmough who shot and killed Tallman with a single bullet from a .22 caliber rifle.

Watmough believed Tallman had stolen $1,400 worth of marijuana, hashish and hash oil from Watmough's truck parked in Lethbridge two days prior to the killing.

Later, he enlisted the help of friends to locate the missing drugs searching for clues in various city bars. Watmough became suspicious of Tallman, who had been in one of the city bars. Tallman later asked Watmough for a ride to the west side of Lethbridge.

After leaving Tallman's friend in west end, Watmough and a companion started questioning Tallman about missing drugs.

The trio then left for a secluded road southeast of Lethbridge.

Tallman was beaten and a knife was held to his throat.

He was then made to lie face down on the edge of the road while Watmough loaded the gun and shot Tallman in the back of the head, killing him instantly.

"This was a brutal and callous crime with the appearance of a execution performed in the dim light of the drug trade," said Langston.

Watmough sobbed in the prisoner's docket while the grisly details of the murder were read in court. The Tallman family showed no emotion with Watmough's parents also in court.

The second man charged with the killing of Tallman, Albert David Morin, 24 of Lethbridge, is scheduled to appear in Court of Queen's Bench March 6 for trial on a charge of first degree murder in Tallman's death.

The Tallman killing sparked a Blood band demand for an investigation into what it called several gangland-style murders which it believes were not properly investigated by the RCMP. The inquiry was agreed to by Premier Don Getty last spring.

Wallace Many Fingers, executive co-ordinator for the Blood tribe, said he was pleased "there was a measure of justice in this case."