A savage killer's parole performance

Ian MacAlpine photo


Every murder is shocking, but some killings sear your soul when you wade through the depravity. The 1986 slaying of Billy MacLeod in Kingston, Ontario, is one of those. In the dark, early morning of May 25, MacLeod, his arms handcuffed behind his back, ran for his life across a newly planted cornfield, desperately hoping to escape the sexual predator who had abducted him. John Lee Jr. (above in 1986) had posed as a police officer and drove MacLeod to a secluded spot north of Kingston. MacLeod did not know Lee, who stabbed him 22 times and left his body in the barren field, snuffing out a young life full of promise. Twenty-three years later, Lee desperately wants out of prison.

MacLeod was a gifted 16-year-old high school athlete, a wrestler and football player who was respected at his school. Lee was a troubled 23-year-old drug addict who delighted in hunting young straight men he could force into gay sex. He had never killed until the night he abducted Billy MacLeod. He did not testify at his trial and has never spoken publicly about the murder. He has refused to acknowledge the killing was sexually motivated, yet the parole records show that authorities fear Lee is a predator who refuses to admit his deviance

The belief that the [murder] was sexually motivated is still held by your Case Management Team (CMT) due to your penchant for having sex with young male inmates and your assertion of having had approximately 700 sexual partners, the majority of whom have been males.

It's still not clear why Lee flew into a murderous frenzy, given the contradictory, self-serving tales he has spun before the National Parole Board, as he pleaded for freedom. In January, he was denied release. Here's the complete record of that decision:



Lee didn't like the board's decision. He appealed to the National Parole Board's appeal division in Ottawa, complaining that keeping him in prison constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, contrary to the Charter of Rights. In the decision below, rendered in June, the appeal division rejected Lee's arguments.



One of the lead police investigators who put Lee away 23 years ago, Larry Willott, told me he hopes Lee never gets out. Here's my account of the case from the Kingston Whig-Standard:

The imprisoned killer who kidnapped and stabbed to death a 16-year-old Kingston boy 23 years ago has failed to win freedom in his first plea for parole.
The appeal division of the National Parole Board has upheld a decision to deny release to John Lee Jr., who is now behind bars in a medium-security prison in British Columbia.
In 1986, Lee savagely murdered Grade 11 student William Patrick MacLeod, who was a star athlete at Regiopolis Notre Dame Catholic high school. Lee was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.
He has been behind bars since his arrest in the spring of 1986.
“I hope he never gets out,” said Larry Willott, the retired OPP officer who was a key member of the investigative team that put Lee behind bars.
Lee, who was 23 at the time of the murder, is 46.
Willott and another officer interrogated Lee for eight hours. He did not confess.
“He wanted to tell us, but he just couldn’t get there,” Willott recalls.
Lee told them: “I know what you guys want to hear but I’m not there yet.”
Lee did not testify at his three-and-a-half day trial and prosecutors never clearly established a motive for the murder. The parole records obtained by the Whig-Standard offer the first public glimpse of Lee’s claims about what drove him to kill.
Some of his assertions are at odds with the conclusions drawn by police and prosecutors and are at odds with the evidence.
The investigation revealed that around 1 a.m. on May 25, 1986, Lee, who cruised Kingston streets hunting boys for sex, pulled alongside MacLeod, a six-foot tall, 180-pound wrestling champ at Regi, who was walking home along Division Street.
MacLeod had been at a party where he may have had one beer.
Lee, who often wore suits, flashed a phoney police badge and told MacLeod he was under arrest. He handcuffed the boy’s hands behind his back, rendering the athletic young man defenceless.
Lee drove MacLeod to a secluded spot north of Kingston and tried to sexually assault him, police believe.
MacLeod must have seen a chance to escape. He bolted and began sprinting across a newly planted cornfield. Lee gave chase.
MacLeod could not outdistance his abductor. With his hands manacled behind his back, he was awkwardly off balance, running in the dark over unfamiliar, uneven terrain.
The teen stumbled in a boggy spot and his left running shoe was wrenched off.
He tumbled onto the dirt.
Lee was on him.
The frenzied predator stabbed MacLeod 22 times – eight times in the back, twice in the chest and 12 times in the face and eyes. One of the thrusts pierced his heart.
MacLeod’s body was found five days later.
Eleven months later, Lee was found guilty.
The knife he used was never found.
Lee was eligible in June last year to seek day parole and unescorted passes from prison.
In prison, he has been troublesome.
“You have a history of manipulative behaviour including: making false and derogatory allegations toward staff members, engaging in hunger strikes, threatening staff and other inmates while incarcerated,” the records note.
Four years ago, he told a staff member: “Why would you put me in the kitchen? Do you want me to stab somebody?”
He appeared before a panel of parole board members in January this year and told them he had learned to deal with his anger, and that he planned to open a food and drink business when he was freed.
He asked for release to a halfway house.
The board noted he is still considered a risk to commit new, violent crimes.
He was denied release.
Lee didn’t like the decision and asked the appeal division of the parole board to reconsider. He claimed his continued imprisonment continues cruel and unusual punishment, contrary to the Charter of Rights.
In a decision last month, the appeal division ruled that Lee was dealt with fairly and the decision to deny parole was reasonable.
At the January parole hearing, Lee offered a series of rationalizations and explanations for the murder, including claims that even the investigating police officers had not heard.
“In your version of this crime, you reported that on the evening of the [murder], you were feeling very angry at your father and the police and decided that you were going to kill someone,” the parole record of his Jan. 26 hearing reveals.
Lee claimed he was physically and emotionally abused by his father. He told parole board members that his father would hog-tie him and whip him with a stick. He said his father sabotaged his development and made it clear he was not “his number one son.”
“I was never taught to deal with anger,” Lee said, according to the records. He also told the board “my parents encouraged me to use violence.” He said he was violent towards his sisters.
Willott said the claims of an abusive father are surprising. He knew Lee’s father as a hard-working and decent businessman who ran a well-known downtown restaurant, the Canton.
Larry Carroll, a retired Kingston Police investigator who also worked on the case, wondered if an abusive father would take desperate measures to keep his son alive behind bars when he was first sent to Millhaven penitentiary.
As a killer of a local boy, Lee would have been reviled by other prisoners.
“Old John was paying protection money to keep him alive inside [prison] and he went out of business shortly afterwards so he must have spent a lot of money,” Carroll said.
Willott said he has talked to parole officials in recent years and offered to travel to British Columbia or to provide information to ensure that Lee stays behind bars.
He didn’t know the parole hearing was being held. No one appeared at the hearing on behalf of MacLeod’s family.
Until Willott read the parole documents, he had never heard the claim that Lee’s father was abusive and that the younger Lee was driven by anger over that abuse.
Lee also told the board that he was feeling suicidal the night of the killing, that he swallowed pills and passed out for a time.
“After waking up, you said that you decided to go for a drive, and it was only then that you noticed a bag in the rear seating area of your vehicle that contained a shiny belt buckle that resembled a police badge, and a pair of handcuffs, which you said you used to arrest non-paying customers at your father’s restaurant,” the document states.
Willott says investigators determined that this wasn’t the first time Lee had impersonated a police officer when hunting sexual partners.
At his trial, jurors heard that Lee sought straight young men for gay sex because he thought he could “turn” them.
Police found two realistic-looking badges and the handcuffs hidden under clothing in a dresser drawer of Lee’s sister. She shared a Thomas Street house with her brother.
The night of the killing, Lee had attended a wedding reception. Willott said videotape obtained by police suggested Lee was extremely high on drugs and was acting strangely.
Lee has admitted to prison authorities that he used LSD, amphetamines, hashish, tranquilizers and marijuana.
“When asked specifically why you selected this victim, you said that you thought that by killing somebody, you would alleviate your homicidal feelings,” the parole records state. “You added, however, that after the murder, you discovered that not only did you still have these ‘homicidal energies,’ but that you also wanted to end your own life.”
Lee denied that the killing was sexually motivated. The parole board noted his “penchant for having sex with young male inmates.”
He claimed to have had 700 sexual partners, mostly male.
The prison staff who manage Lee’s case also believe the murder was sexually motivated.
Lee was asked why his case workers and police hold this view. He said it is because he is homosexual.
“I believe it was sexually motivated right from the get go, especially after the court established his previous numerous attempts to do the same thing,” Willott said.
Carroll scoffed at Lee’s claims that the crime wasn’t sexually motivated.
“I don’t think it had anything to do with the father or anybody else,” Carroll said. “Why else would you handcuff somebody and take them out into a field?”
Lee offered a chilling account of the murder that seemed designed to distance him from suggestions he is a sexual deviant.
He told the board that as soon as he put MacLeod in his jeep, he told the teen he planned to kill him.
“When the victim asked why you selected him, you claimed that you told him he just happened to be the first person you saw,” the records state. “The victim then asked if he could pray.
“You told [him] that he could pray until the end of two songs on the radio. Then you stabbed him numerous times, describing yourself as having been in a frenzied state.”
Willott said investigators believe MacLeod was not stabbed until he ran from the jeep into the cornfield and was caught by Lee.
Lee told the board that he didn’t want to look at his victim because he didn’t want to form a “personal attachment” to him.
Lee’s account of the killing was “devoid of emotion and at times, sounded matter-of-fact,” the parole board noted.
It concluded that his account was not “entirely credible.”
Lee told the parole board that he had a troubled upbringing.
He claimed to have had problems with anger and aggression from the time he was halfway through elementary school. He said he failed every year after Grade 6, but teachers continued to move him on to the next grade.
He was expelled and suspended several times, he said.
“Moreover, you believe that the cause of your violent behaviour was due to your classmates making racial remarks about you,” the record states. “As a child, you claim that you had no close male friends and that you felt closer to females, as you believed that you were female inside.”
Lee had a limited criminal history before the murder, with convictions for possession of a weapon, fraud and uttering a forged document.
He told the board he committed vandalism and shoplifted as a youth.
Willott doesn’t believe Lee is redeemable.
“I don’t think so, I never got that sense,” he said.
An annual football game, the MacLeod Cup, is held between teams from Regiopolis and Holy Cross Catholic Secondary School in Kingston in Billy MacLeod’s memory.
If he were alive, MacLeod would have celebrated his 40th birthday yesterday.

» Whig-Standard court reporter Sue Yanagisawa's wrenching 1987 story of the MacLeod family's agony, on the eve of Lee's murder trial

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