Mark Grant, Acquitted in 1984 Winnipeg Killing, Sentenced to 10 Years for Vancouver Sexual Assault
Lucas Tremblay
8/11/20262 min read
A man who was previously convicted and later acquitted in the killing of a Winnipeg teenager has been sentenced in British Columbia for sexually assaulting and forcibly confining a woman in her 60s.
Mark Edward Grant, 62, was sentenced Monday to 10 years in prison.
After receiving credit for 215 days spent in pre-sentence custody, his remaining sentence was reduced to nine years and 42 days.
Grant Arrested in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside
Grant was arrested Jan. 8 in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside after a woman was sexually assaulted inside a residential building near East Hastings and Columbia streets, according to Vancouver police.
He was charged with unlawful confinement, sexual assault with a weapon and uttering threats.
The Crown later directed a stay of proceedings on the uttering threats charge.
Grant was convicted of sexual assault and forcible confinement.
In addition to the prison sentence, the court imposed a lifetime firearms and weapons prohibition and ordered Grant to provide a DNA sample.
He will also be registered in the national police database under the Sex Offender Information Registration Act.
Previously Convicted in Candace Derksen Killing
Grant previously faced prosecution in one of Manitoba’s most high-profile murder cases — the 1984 killing of Winnipeg teenager Candace Derksen.
Derksen disappeared while walking home from school in Winnipeg’s East Kildonan neighbourhood.
Her body was found on Jan. 17, 1985, inside an industrial storage shed near her home. Her hands and feet had been bound with twine, and she had died from exposure.
More than two decades later, Grant was charged with first-degree murder on May 16, 2007, after investigators determined his DNA matched DNA recovered from the twine.
His first trial began in 2011, exactly 26 years after Derksen’s body was discovered.
A jury convicted Grant of second-degree murder the following month, and he was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Murder Conviction Later Overturned
The Manitoba Court of Appeal overturned Grant’s conviction two years later.
The appeal court found that the trial judge had erred by preventing the defence from presenting evidence pointing toward another possible suspect.
That decision was upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2015.
The Crown subsequently prosecuted Grant a second time in a judge-alone trial beginning in January 2017.
In October of that year, Grant was found not guilty after the judge accepted the defence argument that the DNA evidence relied upon by prosecutors was fundamentally flawed.
Wrongful Conviction Lawsuit Remains Before Courts
Grant filed a lawsuit against Winnipeg police and the Crown in 2019 alleging wrongful conviction.
That case remains before the courts.
Despite the lengthy investigation and two trials involving Grant, no one has been convicted in Candace Derksen’s death, and the 1984 killing remains unsolved.
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