Vancouver — One of the men convicted in a murder-for-hire scheme 30 years ago has been granted overnight leave privileges as part of his ongoing parole.
Documents reveal the Parole Board of Canada granted Derik Lord the new privileges in December despite his ongoing refusal to accept responsibility for the 1990 killings of Sharon Huenemann and Doris Leatherbarrow.
His case management team said the fact that Lord still maintains his innocence decades later makes it "difficult to ascertain" the risk he poses to the public. The team still supported a gradually expanded release plan that includes overnight leave.
The parole documents note that psychological assessments from 2017 and 2019 both considered Lord's risk level to be low or moderate.
They also cite progress reports from the Correctional Service of Canada that found Lord has followed his release conditions, which include orders not to have "direct or indirect contact" with his victims' families or travel anywhere in the Lower Mainland or on Vancouver Island.
Since his initial release on day parole last year, the convict has "worked in the wood shop, worked with a trauma counsellor, worked with a spiritual advisor, maintained contact with a future employer, and continued to build community support," the parole decision reads.
The board also noted that Lord speaks to his wife, who met him while he was incarcerated, and the son they had together on a regular basis. His case management team said that overnight leave would allow him to spend more time with them and his parents, which could help reintegrate him into the community.
The decision to grant Lord day leave in March 2020 shocked and frustrated the victims' family members, who had attended the convict's parole hearings every two years for decades.
"This person should never, ever be paroled. He's going to be out enjoying the freedom that he took away from Doris and Sharon,” Ed Beketa, Sharon Huenemann’s brother-in-law, told CTV News at the time.
The 1992 murder trial heard that Darren Huenemann – Sharon Huenmann's son and Doris Leatherbarrow's grandson – asked his teenage friends Lord and David Muir to kill both women in exchange for a car, home and monthly salary.
Leatherbarrow's wealth was estimated at up to $4 million at the time of her death, and the murders would have left her grandson as the sole heir.
The two women invited Lord and Muir over for dinner on the night they were killed. The court heard the boys hit the victims' heads with crowbars until they were unconscious and then cut their throats with kitchen knives.
All three men were convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. Muir admitted to his role in the killings in 2003 and has been on parole ever since, while Lord, who is now in his late 40s, was denied parole more than 10 times while maintaining his innocence.
