QUOTE OF THE DAY: "For the first time since Jessop disappeared from their home in Queensville, Ont., he said his mother Janet, 78, has found some small peace." “She’s happy with the news, she’s upset it was someone we knew well,” he said. “For the first time in 36 years she won’t go to bed praying to find out who killed her daughter. It’s a miracle, I can’t find another word for it. Police never gave up."
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Second quote of the day: "
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Kenney said Toronto police came across Hoover’s name in the Jessop cold-case file in 2015, following up with an interview. It wasn’t long after, he said, that Hoover died by suicide. (Police said Thursday his death did not involve foul play.) However, Toronto police say Hoover was never interviewed by them. “I am overjoyed for Christine,” Kenney said. “I’m happy no one can point fingers at Guy Paul, I am happy for myself, but the person I am happiest for is Mom. She was starting to believe she would never know.”
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Second passage of the day: "Hoover was identified as Jessop’s killer using an emerging technique called genetic genealogy, which has been used to solve crimes in the U.S. Last year, Toronto police provided a DNA sample from semen found on Jessop’s underwear to Othram Inc., a Texas-based lab that works with law-enforcement agencies. The lab was able to run the sample against DNA databases and create two “family trees” that included distant relatives of Hoover. Toronto police were able to investigate these family trees and, ultimately, test the DNA sample against Hoover’s blood samples held after his death by the Centre of Forensic Sciences. It matched.STORY: "Christine Jessop's brother explains his theory about her abduction after police identify the killer in her 1984 murder," by reporters Jeremi Grimbaldi and Alysha Hasham, published byThe Toronto Star on October 16, 2020.
GIST: “It’s a miracle, a real-life miracle.”
Those were the words Kenney Jessop kept repeating after he learned DNA evidence had revealed the man who abducted and killed his nine-year-old sister Christine Jessop in 1984 was family friend Calvin Hoover, who died in 2015.
For the first time since Jessop disappeared from their home in Queensville, Ont., he said his mother Janet, 78, has found some small peace.
“She’s happy with the news, she’s upset it was someone we knew well,” he said. “For the first time in 36 years she won’t go to bed praying to find out who killed her daughter. It’s a miracle, I can’t find another word for it. Police never gave up."
The announcement by interim Toronto police chief James Ramer on Thursday was also a kind of vindication for Guy Paul Morin, who was wrongfully convicted of Jessop’s murder after a police investigation that was roundly criticized in the landmark Kaufman inquiry and exposed systemic failures in the justice system.
DNA evidence ultimately exonerated Morin and, for decades, he believed DNA would reveal who really abducted and killed her in 1984.
He was finally proven right.
“I was sure that one day DNA would reveal the real killer and now it has,” Morin said in a statement Thursday, after two Toronto police members told him the news. Morin was awarded $1.25 million in compensation for the wrongful conviction and the 18 months he spent in prison.
Hoover was identified as Jessop’s killer using an emerging technique called genetic genealogy, which has been used to solve crimes in the U.S.
Last year, Toronto police provided a DNA sample from semen found on Jessop’s underwear to Othram Inc., a Texas-based lab that works with law-enforcement agencies. The lab was able to run the sample against DNA databases and create two “family trees” that included distant relatives of Hoover. Toronto police were able to investigate these family trees and, ultimately, test the DNA sample against Hoover’s blood samples held after his death by the Centre of Forensic Sciences. It matched.
Jessop was abducted from her house in Queensville, Ont., on Oct. 3, 1984. Her partially clothed body was found three months later on New Year’s Eve in a wooded area 50 kilometres away. She had been raped and tortured.
“I am relieved for Christine’s mother, Janet, and her family, and hope this will give them some peace of mind,” Morin said. “They have been through a dreadful ordeal for 36 years since they lost Christine in 1984.”
At Thursday’s press conference, Ramer asked the public to come forward with any information that would help build a timeline around Jessop’s murder, and about Hoover over the course of his life. He would have been 28 in 1984.
“If he were alive today, Toronto police would arrest Calvin Hoover for the murder of Christine Jessop,” Ramer said.
Hoover had a neighbourly relationship with Jessop’s family at the time, Ramer said. He was not considered a suspect at the time, but his name had come up in the initial police investigation as someone who had access to Christine.
He had a dated criminal record that had “no significance to this investigation,” Ramer said.
Reached by phone Thursday night, a relative of Hoover said she had “been informed” Toronto police had identified him as the killer but declined to comment.
“It’s quite a shock,” she said. “This is all a shock to me.”
Kenney Jessop, who himself was once suspected of being the killer, said that Hoover makes sense as the murderer.
He said Hoover’s wife, Heather, was very close with his mother, Janet Jessop, and worked as a receptionist alongside his father, Bob Jessop, at Eastern Independent Telecom. The families spent time at each other’s homes for birthdays and barbecues.
He said Heather was one of three people who knew that, on the day Christine was abducted, the rest of the family was headed to the Toronto East Detention Centre to visit Bob, who was in jail on charges of misappropriating funds.
“My mother called (my father’s) lawyer, his boss and her friend (Heather) Hoover,” he said, explaining that Janet had been wondering if any information needed to be passed on to Bob during the visit. “In the background (Heather) would have heard Christine having a meltdown because she couldn’t come with us to the jail. She was too young.”
Kenney said he believes Heather may have told Calvin Hoover the information as she was relaying Christine’s yelling and screaming during the telephone conversation.
“She may have said it off the cuff,” he said, explaining that very few people knew about his father’s legal troubles or the fact that he was locked up at the time. “I said from day one it was someone we knew, someone who knew he was in jail.”
Kenney thinks Hoover could have also used this knowledge to persuade Christine to come with him by suggesting he was going to take her see her father in jail.
On Oct. 3, 1984, Christine went to a convenience store to buy gum after returning to an empty home after school, he said.
Upon arriving at home, Kenney believes Christine found Hoover.
It could explain why her coat was hung on a hook too high for her to reach.
Before they left, he believes Christine ran back into the house to get the recorder she’d received at school that day, to show her father.
Kenney believes this was Christine’s way of mimicking her brother, who planned to bring the medals he’d won the night before during his team’s baseball tournament.
He said after visiting his father, he and Janet went to a Sears store to buy Kenney a watch before travelling to the dentist.
It was only when they returned home afterward that they’d discover Christine’s bike haphazardly thrown on the ground near the doorway — which immediately set off alarm bells.
Kenney said Toronto police came across Hoover’s name in the Jessop cold-case file in 2015, following up with an interview.
It wasn’t long after, he said, that Hoover died by suicide. (Police said Thursday his death did not involve foul play.)
However, Toronto police say Hoover was never interviewed by them.
“I am overjoyed for Christine,” Kenney said. “I’m happy no one can point fingers at Guy Paul, I am happy for myself, but the person I am happiest for is Mom. She was starting to believe she would never know.”
He explained that when police finally told him the news, he almost fainted.
“They forgot to tell me to sit down,” he said. “I was crying, I had goosebumps. I was all over the map. Last weekend was Thanksgiving, but I’m thankful most of all for today. I’m still in disbelief. I keep worrying that I will wake up tomorrow to find out this is all a dream.”
