VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Nov. 16 (UPI) -- It cost $102 million to put Canadian serial killer Robert Pickton -- convicted of killing six women and charged in 20 other deaths -- behind bars, records show.
The British Columbia Ministry of the Attorney General said in a statement Monday most of the money -- $70 million -- went to investigating the case, The Vancouver Sun reported. Another nearly $12 million went to pay Pickton's defense team.
The bill also included more than $9 million for pretrial, prosecution and witness costs; nearly $7 million for security and trial support; and $2.4 million for support services for the families of Pickton's victims. The rest went to provincial Supreme Court expenses, management expenses, and corrections and coroners' services.
The tab will go higher yet, the Sun said.
The Pickton cases aren't over. An inquiry has been ordered into the police investigation of the disappearance of dozens of women.
Pickton, a 61-year-old pig farmer from Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, is serving life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years following his 2007 conviction. Many of the women he is suspected of killing were prostitutes and drug users in Vancouver.
