Horribly Misplaced Trust

The man is always described in superlatives of personality, achievement, professionalism and trust. An outstanding member of the Canadian military, with Air Command. Entrusted with high-profile and responsible missions. Being groomed to achieve even higher rank as one of the elite officers in the Canadian military. He was tasked with missions that anticipated exceptional performance from an officer whose previous assignments, one following the other, cast a sterling glow of potential over his future.

A lot of individuals whose capabilities and professionalism clearly marks them as standing head and shoulders above their less-well-endowed colleagues have little idiosyncrasies of character. Or troubled family backgrounds. None of which generally apprehend them in their steady advance toward the heights of social, political and professional recognition. And this man, though the child of a divorce, and then another divorce - clearly unsettling events in anyone's life, remained a high-achiever.

He was well born to parents both of whose careers were out of the ordinary. His step-father brought them even a notch higher in the compact of the entitled landscape and respect of the highly recognized professional engaged in scientific work of the most arcane and internationally regarded esteem. He attended elite private schools, and earned a reputation for intelligence and ambition.

Attending university and graduating with degrees that would stand him in good stead in his future professional choice, he also mastered artistic endeavours. True, in his middle adult years he chose to separate himself from his immediate family, creating a gulf between them that overtures on their part were unable to breach, but this happens in many families, signifying nothing in particular in a wider sense.

Now, everyone who knew Colonel Russell Williams is reeling with disbelief that the highly-charged, reliable, capable leader of men that they knew as a colleague, a former school peer, a neighbour, could be charged with heinous crimes whose vicious character was exemplified by two first-degree murders of young women and the confinement and rape of two others. Impossible to reconcile the man they thought they knew so well, with the man now imprisoned.

Colonel Williams was posted abroad with the Canadian military in various parts of the world; he lived for 14 years in a community not far from National Defence Headquarters in Ottawa, where he also had assignments, and he travelled the country to various military bases where he held significant roles there, as well. Now, any number of unsolved sex crimes against women, some culminating in their deaths, are being re-considered.

People who knew the couple, profess to sentiments of grief and compassion for his wife, herself a well-regarded professional in the private sector. Their childless marriage appeared to be one of mutual regard and respect and huge affection. They were a highly admired couple; he was an exceptional military man whose performance the country's military elite lauded, fully anticipating him to join their ranks.

Now, the family and friends of Corporal Marie-France Comeau, 37 when she was murdered by her ranking officer, finally know the name of her murderer. And Jessica Lloyd, a 27-year-old woman from Belleville known as a cheerful, friendly individual, is being buried, authorities having discovered her remains just where the Commander of Canadian Forces Base Trenton advised them she could be found.

And the distraught and puzzled and betrayed personnel at CFB Trenton hardly know where to turn for comfort. There have been allegations of soldiers being shouted at, or spit upon in public, in the town of Trenton. The legacy of the courage and commitment of Canada's armed forces, reeling under the force of a blow delivered by one of their own.