Ronald Turpin

Ronald Arthur Turpin
Born	29 April 1933 Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Died	11 December 1962 (aged 29) Don Jail, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Cause of death	Execution by hanging
Criminal status	Executed
Motive	To avoid arrest
Conviction	Capital murder
Criminal penalty	Death
Details
Victims	Frederick Nash, 31
Date	12 February 1962
Country	Canada
Location	Toronto

Ronald Arthur Turpin (29 April 1933 – 11 December 1962) was one of the last two people to be executed in Canada. Turpin had been convicted of the February 1962 murder of Metropolitan Toronto police officer Frederick "Jack" Nash, 31.

Early life

Turpin was born Donald Arthur Neumann in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada on 29 April 1933. His parents were separated at the time of his birth, and were divorced by 1935. His mother's second marriage was to Emil Turpin, from whom he took his last name; as a teenager, he began calling himself Ronald instead of his given name Donald, for reasons unknown.

From an early age, Turpin was often placed in the care of various relatives by his alcoholic mother, and was sexually abused by several of them. He was placed in foster homes by the age of 11, from which he routinely ran away. As a teenager, he was sent to a reformatory school after a string of petty thefts. At sixteen years of age in 1949, he was convicted in Ottawa of shopbreaking with intent, and theft. By the time of his mid-twenties, living in various locales in southern Ontario and the northern US, Turpin had served jail sentences for auto theft (eighteen months); for mail theft in Danbury, Connecticut (two years); and for evading lawful custody (six months).

Moving to Toronto circa 1960, Turpin worked for a time as a rental agent for furnished apartments. In 1961, he went to trial for assaulting his landlord, but was found not guilty. Also in 1961, he was identified as a person of interest in the unsolved murder of small-time local criminal Lorne Gibson (a murder which remains unsolved to this day), as well as a suspect in a non-fatal shooting incident that happened at the apartment of Della Burns (his sometime girlfriend) on Wellesley Street East in October 1961. Turpin spent some time in Buffalo, New York in late 1961 and early 1962 while the police visited Burns' apartment on a near-daily basis trying to find and capture Turpin. By January 1962, he had returned to Toronto. Fearful of capture by the police, he stayed with a series of friends, seldom remaining in the same household for more than a day or two.

Murder of Frederick Nash

In the early morning hours of 12 February 1962, Turpin was driving a battered 1954 Pontiac sedan delivery truck, returning from an after-hours burglary of the Red Rooster restaurant on Kingston Road in Scarborough, Ontario. Nash, patrolling alone in a vehicle near the corner of Danforth Avenue and Dawes Road in Toronto's east end, pulled Turpin over for a broken taillight. After pulling him over, Nash recognized Turpin from an earlier police bulletin, concerning the apartment shooting on Toronto's Wellesley Street East in October 1961. (Turpin was never formally charged with or convicted of this shooting.) Nash then ordered Turpin out of his truck. Concealed under the front seat of Turpin's vehicle was a little over $600 in cash (from the just-completed burglary) as well as a gun.

Though there's some variance in the testimony of eyewitnesses, it's generally agreed that while leaving the vehicle, Turpin grabbed his gun and the two men got into a shootout. Nash suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the abdomen. Turpin was hit twice, once in the arm and once in the face, giving him a scar on his left cheek.

Nash, a father of four, died shortly after being rushed to Toronto East General Hospital from the scene. Turpin was subsequently charged with the capital murder of a police officer.

Trial and aftermath

Turpin did not deny he shot Nash; numerous witnesses also saw the shooting and testified to that effect. His defense attorneys argued that Turpin was in fear for his life at the time of the incident, as he believed the police were trying to frame him for the Wellesley Street apartment shooting, and that Turpin had received threats on his life from police officers who would "shoot him on sight". This defense was unsuccessful, and Turpin was found guilty and sentenced to death after a 15-day trial.

The method of execution was hanging, and the sentence was carried out at the Don Jail. The other prisoner simultaneously executed was Arthur Lucas, who had been convicted of an unrelated murder. The CBC reports that when both men were informed that they would likely be the last people ever to hang in Canada, Turpin said, "Some consolation." Alternatively, the Toronto Star reports Turpin to have said in his final hours "If our dying means capital punishment in this country will be abolished for good, we will not have died in vain."

Despite the death of Nash, Toronto police authorities continued to send out one-man cruisers on overnight shifts, even though two-man cruisers were the norm in many other North American cities, and the norm in Toronto during daylight hours. Costs were cited as the reason. Police unions and other interested parties took the matter to court, citing Nash's death (among other incidents) as one of the motivating factors. Ontario courts finally ordered two-man cruisers to be used on all shifts starting in 1974.

Capital punishment for murder was officially removed from Canada's Criminal Code in 1976, although it could still be used under the National Defence Act until 1998. Despite being on the books as a potential penalty for many years after the 1962 simultaneous executions of Turpin and Lucas, these remained the final instances of capital punishment in Canadian history.