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This is the final part of a three-part series. Where we left off, it was 1984, and Colin Thatcher was on trial for the murder of his ex-wife, Joanne Wilson.

The Crown had finished laying out its case, which included testimony about the various

statements Colin gave to Gary Anderson and Charles Wilde about arranging to have Joanne

killed. There was the recorded conversation with

Gary and statements reported by Collins Palm Springs girlfriend Lynn Mandel. There was his purchase

of a revolver, special ammunition and a holster in the United States, which Lynn said had been hidden

in a Barbie doll shower box and taken to Canada,

and the fact that the police found those items at his home in Moose Jaw. There was the blue

Oldsmobile seen surveilling Joanne's house in the days before she was murdered that matched

a car that Colin Thatcher had borrowed from the government, and the fact that his

credit card receipt was found feet from the crime scene when it had no reason to be there.

But there was one more surprise witness that the Crown hadn't banked on, and he likely wouldn't have

come forward had he not had a chance encounter with investigators

after the trial had started.

The last witness for the Crown was Richard Dick Culver, Colin's close friend and former leader

of the Saskatchewan Progressive Conservative Party

who wooed Colin Thatcher over from the Liberal Party.

You might recall that after Colin and Joanne first separated,

Richard Dick Culver invited him and the kids to visit at his family ranch in the United States over Christmas.

Colin showed up with his three kids, as well as their longtime babysitter Sandra, who was 17 years old at the time.

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