Cross-dressing rapist and killer colonel

[Ieyasu Tokugawa]

Cross-dressing rapist and killer colonel

New York PostDaily Mirror, UK Published Oct 20 2010

Col. Russell Williams being led into court - Photo Credit: Julie Oliver, Ottawa Citizen​

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A commander of Canada's largest air force base, who was so highly regarded that he piloted Britain's royal family, led a double life as a vicious sex criminal - torturing, raping and killing at least two women and breaking into dozens of other women's homes to steal their bras and panties that he had a penchant for wearing. Col. Russell Williams sat through a sentencing hearing in Ottawa Tuesday as prosecutors detailed how he raped, photographed, videotaped and eventually killed a 37-year-old corporal who was a military flight attendant under his command. Williams, 47, pleaded guilty to the murder of Cpl. Marie Comeau, whom he recorded as she lay bound and begging for her life before he suffocated her.

Col. Russell William had a penchant for wearing stolen bras and panties​

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Comeau's murder was one of two that Williams admitted in court. He also pleaded guilty to two other sexual assaults and 82 charges of breaking and entering to steal lingerie belonging to teenaged girls and young women.

Cpl. Marie Comeau was tortured and murdered​

A stash of women's undergarments taken from Williams' Ottawa home was linked to the burglaries near his home and his job. He faces an automatic sentence of life in prison with no possibility of parole for at least 25 years. Williams, who is married, sat slumped in the courtroom as prosecutors played the tapes of Comeau's torture-murder.

Bruised, bloodied and limp, Comeau used her last breath to beg for her life. "Have a heart, please," she's heard pleading on an audiotape played in court. "I've been good all my life. I don't want to die." "Shut up," Williams responded before he taped her nostrils and her mouth closed and watched her suffocate.

The stash of women's undergarments that were taken from Williams' home​

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Overcome by the brutal recording, some courtroom observers fled in tears. Until his double life came to light with his arrest earlier this year, Williams was the commander of Canada's largest air force base and served as a pilot for some of the country's top leaders and for Queen Elizabeth II during a 2005 visit.

The charges against the elite pilot - a tall, fit figure who did his job with quiet diligence and appeared to be in a stable marriage - shocked the country and its military with the possibility of a serial killer in its officer corps. Among other things, Williams pleaded guilty to murdering Jessica Lloyd, 27, whose body was found in February, and Comeau, who was found dead in her home last November. Both women were also raped and strangled.