Karla Homolka | |
---|---|
Born |
Port Credit, Ontario, Canada |
May 4, 1970
Residence | Châteauguay, Quebec |
Other names | Karla Leanne Teale, Leanne Bordelais, Emily Bordelais |
Criminal charge | Manslaughter |
Criminal penalty | 12 years imprisonment |
Criminal status | Unconditionally released July 4, 2005 |
Spouse(s) |
Paul Bernardo (1991-1994) Thierry Bordelais (current) |
Children | 3 (second marriage) |
Killings | |
Victims | 3 killed |
Span of killings
|
December 24, 1990–April 19, 1992 |
Country | Canada |
Karla Leanne Homolka (born May 4, 1970), also known as Karla Leanne Teale and Leanne Bordelais, is a Canadian serial killer who, with her husband Paul Bernardo, raped and murdered at least three young women. She attracted worldwide media attention when she was convicted of manslaughter following a plea bargain in the 1991 and 1992 rape-murders of two Ontario teenage girls, Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French, as well as the rape and death of her sister Tammy.
Homolka and Bernardo were arrested in 1993. In 1995, Bernardo was convicted of the two teenagers' murders and received life in prison and a dangerous offender designation, the full maximum sentence allowed in Canada. During the 1993 investigation, Homolka stated to investigators that Bernardo had abused her and that she had been an unwilling accomplice to the murders. As a result, she struck a deal with prosecutors for a reduced prison sentence of 12 years in exchange for a guilty plea for manslaughter. Homolka scored 5/40 on the Psychopathy Checklist, in contrast to Bernardo's 35/40.
However, videotapes of the crimes surfaced after the plea bargain and demonstrated that she was a more active participant than she had claimed. As a result, the deal that she had struck with prosecutors was dubbed in the Canadian press the "Deal with the Devil". Public outrage about Homolka's plea deal continued until her high-profile release from prison in 2005.
Following her release from prison, she settled in the province of Quebec, where she married again and gave birth to a boy. In 2007, the Canadian press reported that she had left Canada for the Antilles with her husband and their baby, and had changed her name to Leanne Teale. In 2012, journalist Paula Todd found Homolka living in Guadeloupe, under the name Leanne Bordelais, with her husband and their three children. On October 17, 2014, the jury in the first-degree murder trial of Luka Magnotta heard that Karla Homolka is living in Quebec.