In a suburban Abbotsford home in May 2022, Arnold and Joanne De Jong — a retired couple in their late seventies — were killed in their beds by three men who had come prepared to do harm. Four years later, a British Columbia Supreme Court justice found all three guilty of first-degree murder, rejecting the notion that chance or chaos had driven the violence. The verdict names the act for what the evidence showed it to be: deliberate, calculated, and intimate in its cruelty. For the family left behind, the law has spoken — but the silence where two lives once were remains unchanged.
Three men convicted of murdering Abbotsford retired couple in their beds
Arnold and Joanne De Jong, both retired, were murdered in their beds in a violent home invasion; their family continues to grieve the loss.
We're the ones with the life sentence
Mark
Why does it matter that one of the defendants owned the roof-cleaning company that had worked on their home?
Mimi
It suggests access and familiarity. He knew the layout of the house, where the bedrooms were, how the property was arranged. That's not coincidence in a case like this.
Luke
But the article doesn't say whether he'd been inside the home or only worked on the exterior. That's an important distinction that isn't clarified.
Mark
The judge said three people were needed. Does that mean the crime couldn't have been done by two?
Mimi
The judge was saying that based on the evidence of what happened—the violence, the scale of it, the way it unfolded—three people were required. It speaks to how coordinated and brutal it was.
Luke
Right, but that's the judge's interpretation of the evidence. We don't know the specific details of what happened in those bedrooms, so we can't independently verify whether two people truly couldn't have done it.
Mark
What strikes you most about the daughter's statement?
Mimi
That she's honest about what a guilty verdict actually does and doesn't do. It doesn't bring her parents back. It doesn't erase the trauma. But it does confirm that what happened was recognized as the worst crime the law recognizes.
Luke
She's also saying something harder: that her family is now serving a sentence too, just not a legal one. That's the real weight of the story.
Mark
Do we know anything about motive?
Mimi
The prosecution presented it as a planned robbery that turned into murder. But the judge rejected the idea it was a botched robbery—she called it calculated.
Luke
But we don't actually know what the motive was. Was it money? Was it something else? The article doesn't say, and the judge's ruling doesn't clarify the why, only that it was deliberate.
El Pulso
- A retired couple was murdered in their beds during a planned home invasion, their deaths marked by suffocation and repeated blunt force — violence that a judge would later call intimate and prolonged.
- The trial revealed a trail of premeditation: rope, a screwdriver, and a softball bat purchased the day before the killings, and Google searches about Canadian murder sentences conducted by one defendant after news of the deaths broke.
- Defence lawyers argued the killings were an unplanned robbery gone wrong and challenged whether evidence placed each specific client in the rooms where the violence happened — but the court found none of it persuasive.
- Justice Brenda Brown convicted all three men of first-degree murder, stating the killings spoke of calculation and determination and that the coordinated nature of the invasion required all three participants.
- Outside the courthouse, the couple's daughter said the verdict brings relief but not wholeness — her family, she made clear, is the one serving the true life sentence.
In a suburban Abbotsford home in May 2022, Arnold and Joanne De Jong — a retired couple in their late seventies — were killed in their beds by three men who had come prepared to do harm. Four years later, a British Columbia Supreme Court justice found all three guilty of first-degree murder, rejecting the notion that chance or chaos had driven the violence. The verdict names the act for what the evidence showed it to be: deliberate, calculated, and intimate in its cruelty. For the family left behind, the law has spoken — but the silence where two lives once were remains unchanged.
Arnold De Jong, 77, was found in his bed with duct tape sealed over his nose and mouth. His wife Joanne, 76, lay nearby, her death the result of repeated blows. It was May 2022 in Abbotsford, British Columbia. On Friday, four years later, three men were convicted of their murders.
Abhijeet Singh, Khushveer Toor, and Gurkaran Singh had been charged with planning and carrying out the killings. Singh owned a roof-cleaning company that had previously serviced the De Jongs' home. The day before the murders, he purchased rope, a screwdriver, and a softball bat. That night, prosecutors said, the three men left their shared rental unit prepared to deliver violence — and drove to the couple's house.
The physical evidence was damning. The softball bat, recovered from a car linked to the men, carried Joanne De Jong's DNA. A shoe print on a bloody bedsheet was consistent with Toor's footwear. Fingerprints on a glass patio door were linked to Gurkaran Singh. After the killings appeared in local news, Singh searched Google for the punishment for murder in Canada and jail sentences for international students — searches prosecutors offered as evidence of a guilty conscience.
The defence argued the deaths resulted from a robbery that spiraled out of control, and that evidence was insufficient to place each defendant specifically in the rooms where the violence occurred. Supreme Court Justice Brenda Brown rejected these arguments entirely. The murders, she said, spoke of calculation and determination — intimate and prolonged, requiring all three men to carry out in the way they did. All three were convicted of first-degree murder.
Outside the courthouse, the couple's daughter Sandra Barthel said she had barely slept all week. The verdict brought relief, she acknowledged — but she was careful to separate relief from healing. 'We went in knowing, no matter what, we're the ones with the life sentence,' she said. Arnold and Joanne De Jong were gone. No verdict could return them.
Arnold De Jong, 77, was found dead in his bed with duct tape sealed around his nose and mouth. His wife Joanne, 76, lay in her bed surrounded by blood. When the medical examiner finished, the cause was clear: Arnold had suffocated; Joanne had died from the force of repeated blows. This was May 2022 in Abbotsford, British Columbia. On Friday, four years later, three men were convicted of their murders.
Abhijeet Singh, Khushveer Toor, and Gurkaran Singh—an international student from India—had been charged with planning and executing the killings. The trial lasted eight weeks. What emerged from the courtroom was a portrait of deliberation. A day before the murders, Singh, who owned a roof-cleaning company that had serviced the De Jongs' home, purchased rope, a screwdriver, and a softball bat from a hardware store. That night, the three men left their shared rental unit carrying these items, prosecutors said, "prepared to deliver violence." They drove to the couple's house and forced their way inside.
The physical evidence was methodical. Police found the softball bat in the trunk of a car linked to the three men; a DNA swab from the bat matched Joanne De Jong. A shoe print on a bloody bedsheet in Joanne's room could have been made by footwear worn by Toor. Fingerprints on a glass patio door were linked to Gurkaran Singh's left hand. After news of the killings appeared in the local newspaper, Singh conducted Google searches about the punishment for murder in Canada and jail sentences for international students—searches that prosecutors presented to show consciousness of guilt.
The defence argued the deaths resulted from a robbery that spiraled out of control, and that each defendant's lawyers maintained there was insufficient evidence placing their specific client in the bedrooms where the violence occurred. But Supreme Court Justice Brenda Brown rejected these arguments entirely. "The murders speak of calculation and determination," she said from the bench. She called the killings "intimate and prolonged" and concluded that three perpetrators were necessary to carry out the invasion and murders in the manner they occurred. All three were convicted of first-degree murder.
Outside the courthouse, the couple's daughter Sandra Barthel spoke to reporters. She had not slept well all week, she said, knowing the verdict was coming. "We went in knowing, no matter what, we're the ones with the life sentence," she said. "And we had to tell ourselves that a verdict isn't going to make us whole again, but it would feel a lot better if it was a first-degree murder conviction." The family expressed relief and gratitude that the men had been found guilty of the most serious charge. But relief and gratitude, she made clear, were not the same as healing. The De Jongs were gone. Their daughter and the rest of their family would carry that absence for the rest of their lives.
Citas Notables
The murders speak of calculation and determination.— Supreme Court Justice Brenda Brown
We went in knowing, no matter what, we're the ones with the life sentence. A verdict isn't going to make us whole again, but it would feel a lot better if it was a first-degree murder conviction.— Sandra Barthel, daughter of the victims
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Crime & Justice