Killing of Richard Oland

Richard Henry Oland, a 69-year-old businessman from Saint John, New Brunswick, was bludgeoned to death in his second-floor office at 52 Canterbury Street between July 6 and July 7, 2011. Oland had been a vice-president of Moosehead Breweries until 1981, when a leadership dispute with his brother, Derek Oland, led their father to choose Derek to run the company; Richard went on to build several New Brunswick businesses, including Kinghurst Estates Limited, Brookville Transport Limited, and the investment firm Far End Corporation, and he served as president of the 1985 Canada Summer Games Society. He was last seen alive in his office on the evening of July 6, 2011, by his son, Dennis Oland, who told police he left at about 6:30 p.m. The next morning, Oland's personal assistant, Maureen Adamson, found his body face down in a pool of blood. A forensic pathologist counted 45 wounds to his hands, neck, and head, and a police sergeant testified the office was one of the bloodiest crime scenes of his career. No weapon was ever recovered or entered into evidence at trial.

Dennis Oland was interviewed by police for more than five hours on the day the body was found and was told partway through by the interviewing officer that he was the primary suspect. In November 2013 he was charged with second-degree murder; police said no one else would be charged. At a 37-day preliminary inquiry, Judge Ronald LeBlanc reviewed forensic evidence, including bloodstains matching Richard Oland's DNA found on a brown jacket Dennis had worn to the office, alongside cell-phone and financial records. LeBlanc concluded the Crown had not established a clear motive and said police had presumed Dennis's guilt too quickly based on an unsubstantiated hunch, but he nonetheless committed Dennis Oland to stand trial.

Dennis Oland's trial began September 16, 2015, and at 65 days became the longest in New Brunswick history. On December 19, 2015, he was convicted of second-degree murder and was later sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for at least ten years. The trial also exposed failures by the Saint John Police Force to protect the crime scene from contamination, including using the office bathroom for two days before it was tested for evidence and allowing officers to walk through the scene without protective equipment. Deputy Chief Glen McCloskey, who was among those who entered the scene, was later accused of asking colleagues to misrepresent his presence there under oath; he was investigated by the New Brunswick Police Commission and by Halifax police but was cleared and was not criminally charged.

On October 24, 2016, the New Brunswick Court of Appeal overturned Dennis Oland's conviction, finding the trial judge had erred in his jury instructions, and ordered a new trial. Before the retrial could proceed as a jury trial, a mistrial was declared after it emerged that a police computer had been used to research the prospective jury pool, and the retrial instead went ahead before a judge alone. Testimony and video evidence about the timing of events near Oland's office on the night of the killing led the defence to argue that Dennis could not have been present when the fatal attack occurred. On July 19, 2019, Dennis Oland was found not guilty. Following the case, the Provincial Police Commission investigated the Saint John Police Force's handling of the original homicide investigation.