Basil Borutski, who killed three women in Ottawa Valley, dies in prison

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When Basil Borutski was sentenced to jail in the murders of three women in Renfrew County, the judge said his actions were so deplorable Borutski would spend the rest of his life in jail.

On Sept. 22, 2015, Borutski strangled Carol Culleton, 66, who was at her cottage near Combermere. He stole her car and drove to Wilno, where he shot Anastasia Kuzyk, 36. Then he drove to the home of Nathalie Warmerdam, 48, on Foymount Road, and shot her. Borutski was arrested in a Kinburn field by an Ottawa police tactical team.

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At the December 2017 sentencing, Justice Robert Maranger sentenced Borustki to consecutive life sentences with no chance of parole for 70 years. Borutski died at the Millhaven Institution in Bath on March 28 “of apparent natural causes,” according to a media release from the Correctional Service of Canada.

“I think this is a complicated day for people in Renfrew County and for those who knew this person and knew of his violence. There’s no right or wrong way to feel about it,” said Kristen Mercer, a feminist lawyer who represented End Violence Against Women Renfrew County, a coalition of community groups, during a coroner’s inquest into the deaths in June 2022.

“There are supports for those who find this is difficult. They should reach out.”

The June 2022 inquest jury delivered 86 recommendations, including asking the province to formally declare intimate partner violence (IPV) an epidemic.

The five jurors, three men and two women, also recommended that the federal government establish a Royal Commission to review the criminal justice system to make it more victim-centric and responsive to the root causes of crime, and also urged the federal government to explore adding the term “femicide” to the Criminal Code.

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Borutski had a long history of defying the justice system, according to testimony at his trial and the inquest. He had been convicted of assaulting Kuzyk and Warmerdam, and was stalking Culleton on the day of the murders. He did not attend a single session of partner abuse counselling despite a 2013 court order. He was barred from driving, but frequently borrowed a neighbour’s car. Despite a lifetime weapons ban, he carried a firearms possession and acquisition licence up to the day he killed the three women.

The inquest probed many of the ways the system had failed to stop Borutski and protect his victims.

When the recommendations were released, those involved in the inquest considered the extensive list of recommendations to be a triumph. But when the parties reconvened in June 2023 to discuss progress, they were disappointed by the province’s responses.

LISTEN:An Unthinkable Tragedy in the Ottawa Valley

The province rejected the idea of formally declaring intimate partner violence (IPV) to be an epidemic, arguing that term “epidemic” is used for the spread of disease, specifically an outbreak of infection that spreads rapidly and affects many individuals in a given area or population at the same time.

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Mercer notes that despite the province’s refusal to declare an epidemic, there has been progress on the local level. Almost 100 municipalities, including Ottawa, have declared IPOV to be an epidemic. Ottawa city council passed its motion on International Women’s Day 2023. Renfrew County and Lanark County have also declared IPV to be an epidemic.

“It has continued to pick up steam. It has been the real source of hope,” she said. “We know that police have increased openness and sensitivity. At the end of the day, the most meaningful changes are local. That’s where survivors live.”

The federal government has also released a National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence, and the federal and provincial governments have signed bilateral agreements. “We believe that will unlock some resources,” said Mercer.

At the same time, advocates have noted there are still an alarming number of femicides. During the height of the pandemic, researchers noted there had been a “shadow pandemic” of violence against women and girls reported around the world.

According to a November 2023 report from the Ontario Association of Interval & Transition Houses, which tracks the violent deaths of women and their families through media reports, there had been 62 women and children killed in the previous 52 weeks. In that time period, there had been 93 charges laid against 57 men accused in relation to these femicides, while another 14 cases were deemed a femicide-suicide.

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“I don’t think that all of those people who were horrified by the femicides of Carol Culleton, Anastasia Kuzyk and Nathalie Warmerdam will wake up tomorrow feeling that true justice has been done and they can rest. We are a long way from that,” said Mercer.

The criminal justice system did what it was designed to do. But that is not what justice looks like to survivors, she said. Justice won’t be served until we do everything in our power to end gender-based violence, she said.

“That is the way that we will honour the women he killed, and it is only that kind of change that will bring true justice for them, for their families and for all those who live with violence.”

With files from Aedan Helmer and Marlo Glass

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