Penney became more truthful as he relaxed into purported crime group, Crown alleges
Why did Penney give the RCMP different details in the two confessions?
Patten says Penney was holding back details in the first confession because he was paranoid. He questioned the crime boss’s authenticity to his face, Patten says. He questioned if the police were going to come storming in to arrest him if he started talking.
He first tells a story of how Hillier-Penney fell over the stairs during a heated argument. He says he disposed of the body and gave coordinates to the crime boss. But these coordinates are nowhere near Penney’s cabin, Patten says. He suggests Penney made up the coordinates so they wouldn’t find anything in case they were police officers.
A week later he feels more relaxed, Patten says, because nothing happened after his confession. Nobody came to arrest him. The gang continued working with him.
Now he’s ready to give more details. He describes how he bludgeoned Hillier-Penney with a hammer after she went over the stairs. This time, he marks an X on a map in an area of water closer to his cabin. Not the coordinates he’d given them before.
Patten says there are more similarities than differences in both statements. The two biggest discrepancies in the second confession — how she died and where he dumped the body — are extensions of the first confession, Patten argues, due to Penney being more comfortable the second time around.
