Possible tooth fragments, jewellery found in ash from murder suspect’s farm
CALGARY — The chief forensic investigator in a triple murder trial choked back tears in court describing how he found suspected fragments of teeth and jewelry while sifting through ash from the accused’s farm near Calgary.
Const. Ian Oxton described the 10 painstaking months he spent using a new method involving water to recover tiny fragments obtained from a burning barrel and pit on Douglas Garland’s farm.
Garland is on trial for three counts of first-degree murder in the disappearance of Alvin and Kathy Liknes and their five-year-old grandson Nathan O’Brien in 2014. Their bodies have not been recovered.
Oxton said he spent around 550 hours looking for evidence in hundreds of litres of ash. He said he recovered about four pounds of “possible biological material.”


