From his home in Australia, Bret McCann is ready to face his parents’ killer for the first time in years.
“Our family’s loss was huge, and our pain is everlasting. I will never forget or forgive what Vader has done,” McCann told CityNews.
Travis Vader has applied for day parole and is set to face a parole board in Abbotsford, B.C., Thursday morning.
Vader was convicted of manslaughter in the 2010 disappearance of Alberta seniors Lyle and Marie McCann.
While the McCanns’ eldest son will never forgive Vader, he tells CityNews he understands the purpose of the parole bord is rehabilitation of offenders and to facilitate their ultimate reintegration back into society.
Brett McCann believes one element is essential to Vader’s rehabilitation: “he needs to admit to having committed the murder of my parents. Throughout the whole trial, you know, he’s constantly sort of mocking our family, but he never acknowledged his guilt.
“I really believe that this would be a prerequisite to any possibility of ever being able to become a normal part of society.”
The couple, in their 70s, vanished after leaving their home in St. Albert, a bedroom community north of Edmonton, in July 2010.
Their burned-out motorhome and a vehicle they had been towing were discovered days later west of the city, but their bodies have never been found.
Justice Denny Thomas convicted Vader in 2016 of second-degree murder but later substituted the verdict with manslaughter, because he had mistakenly used an outdated section of the Criminal Code.
Vader did not know the McCanns and has never revealed the location of their remains.
“It is very important to myself and to my family that my parents remains’ be located and be buried properly,” said Brett McCann.
He is hoping this is a factor included in Vader’s parole decision.
“I think it’s a critical component of our grieving. And the one individual who knows what happened to my parents and where my parents’ remains are has said nothing. Vader must reveal what he did with my parents remains.”
–With files from The Canadian Press