Vengeace for the Not-so-Hidden Past

"Everyone around here used to go to the big palm nut farm to cut palm and make oil to eat and sell."
"General Bill Horace and his men were passing. They entered the plantation and accused us of looting the place. He then ordered his men to arrest people."
"They started chasing us, and everybody was running all over the place. They then started firing at us. I first saw one woman fall. The bullet hit her on the head. Her husband was crying. Then one of the other fighters shot him also.Both of them died instantly."
Eyewitness report, Liberia's Truth and Reconciliation

"Many of us [Liberians] are here in Canada as a result of that war."
"We became refugees directly as a result of that war ... It has become a reality in the Liberian community that our community is a mix of victims of war crimes and the perpetrators at the same time."
Leo Johnson, president, Liberian Association of Canada

"The London Police Service has received several media inquiries about the identity of the deceased and possible historical association to [the] National Patriotic Front in Liberia."
"The London Police Service is aware of these inquiries, but cannot confirm this fact at this time."
London Police Service statement

The house where four masked men stormed through the door on early Sunday morning. Police said an altercation between the intruders and Bill Horrace likely spilled out of the home and onto a neighbour's yard. (Colin Butler/CBC News)

Neighbours of the occupants of a house in London, Ontario, reported seeing four men wearing face masks forcing their way into the house where 44-year-old Bill Horace lived with his family. Two of the men went to the front door and two  to the back. The neighbour heard a struggle, saw Mr. Horace dash out the front door, and there he was shot to death. His family was at home at the time. The four men were seen to leave the scene in two cars, after gunshots rang out.

The victim was taken to hospital by paramedics, and there he was pronounced dead. Initially, police stated their belief that this was no random incident, although they appeared not to know why the man had been targeted. And then the man was identified as the former leader of a rebel militia engaged in the 1990s war in Liberia and Sierra Leone in the late 1990s. And despite having been accused by former associates and witnesses of commanding "atrocities on a massive scale", the man lived quietly in Canada, a former general in the National Patriotic Front of Liberia..

Bill Horrace  (Facebook)

In 2012 Canada launched an investigation into war crimes purportedly committed by this man, the same year the former president of Liberia and leader of the NPFL, Charles Taylor, was convicted at the Special Court for Sierra Leone for planning, aiding and abetting war crimes, some of which were characterized as among the worst in recorded history. Taylor is serving a 50-year prison sentence in Britain.

Horace had sought refugee status in Canada in 2001 with false documents. He would have been declared inadmissible for entry to Canada had his true identity been known, as a rebel leader who was accused of war crimes inclusive of murder, rape and torture. He had made his way to Ghana before embarking on a journey to Canada using a false name and Dutch documents.

"It's a tragedy, because I think he evaded justice for alleged crimes. Nobody, regardless of their alleged past, deserves to die like that."
"What I've come to learn is that it's generally easier to simply deport somebody rather than convict them for war crimes."
"Because the burden of proof is so high, often it's easier to deport somebody because they lied on their refugee claim than it is to convict them of crimes against humanity."
"There are many people that would have liked to have seen him brought to justice. Getting gunned down is not justice. A legal process is justice."
"I'm confident a legal case could have been built against Bill Horace. The fact that he was still living freely, a decade after the evidence I had compiled was made publicly available, I think is troubling, and I think suggests that even if another 10 years went by, he might still be here."  
Michael Petrou, journalist, professor, Carleton University

"It's not within the Canadian Security Intelligence Service mandate. It's not terrorism, it's not espionage, it's not foreign interference and it's not subversion."
"The only people who may have been looking at him would have been the RCMP, because they would have a mandate to cooperate with the International Criminal Court at The Hague in case this guy was up on charges."
Phil Gurski, Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting

Police investigate a fatal home shooting in London, Ont., on June 22, 2020.