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Brett Ryan
Brett Ryan, a 36-year-old ex-bank robber was terrified his family would expose the web of lies he told his fiancee – so he murdered his mum and two brothers using a crossbow.
According to The Sun UK, the man was engaged to Kristen Baxter despite the fact she knew about his bizarre and inexplicable stint as a bank robber.
But there was another secret he couldn’t tell her – one he considered so mortifying that when his mother and brothers threatened to expose the truth before the wedding, Ryan murdered them.
Almost a decade ago, Ryan’s break-up with another girlfriend had triggered a depressive episode that led to him to commit a series of heists in Canada disguised as an elderly man, earning him the nickname “The Fake Beard Bandit”.
But the spree was so out of character for the sweet, popular Ryan that the judge rejected the 10-year sentence requested by prosecutors and gave him just three years and nine months.
Good behaviour resulted in the Parole Board of Canada granting Ryan day release after just 15 months, noting that he did not suffer from major mental illness, psychopathy or have a history of violence.
In fact “this circumstance has reconnected you to your family”, the board wrote.
Brett Ryan was willing to kill his own family to keep a secret from his fiancee Kristen Baxter
Seven counselling sessions (a condition of his day parole) later, a psychologist treating Ryan declared that he no longer needed therapy.
“You remain a low risk for offending,” the board wrote in 2011, granting him full parole.
Just six years later, Ryan strangled his mother Susan and shot his brothers Christopher and Alexander to death with a crossbow in a triple homicide on August 25, 2016.
“The Fake Beard Bandit” was now “The Crossbow Killer”.
On Friday, the 36-year-old was sentenced to three life sentences without the possibility of parole after admitting to their murders and the attempted murder of a third brother Leigh, 38.
Kristen, a petite blonde physiotherapist, had met her future husband while he was still on parole and wasn’t fussed about dating an ex-con.
But there were still things Ryan has not been honest about. According to The Toronto Star, he told Baxter he had graduated from college in April last year when in fact he had dropped out months earlier.
He got a job at an IT company only to lose it in June 2016 when his employers found out about his bank robber past and fired him.
Unable to tell Kristen the disappointing news, Ryan simply pretended he was working from home.
The charade went on for months before Ryan’s mother Susan urged him to come clean about his job loss before his wedding, which was just one month away, even offering to support him until he could get back on his feet again.
However, she also told him that if he did not tell Kristen the truth, she would cut him off financially.
Days before the triple murders, Ryan hid a crossbow in his mother’s garage and set up an iPad and iPhone to create an electronic footprint in his home, according to police.
“Brett Ryan was worried that if his fiancee discovered the web of lies, she’d call off the wedding,” Justice John McMahon said at the sentencing hearing.
“This was a sophisticated plan to build in an alibi, although these devices were never used.”
On August 25, 2016, Ryan confronted his mother in her home and the pair had a blazing argument. When the row became too heated for comfort, Susan Ryan rang Brett’s older brother Christopher for help.
Brett retrieved the crossbow, stabbed his mom with a bolt, then strangled her to death with a yellow nylon rope, the court heard.
He laid in wait for Christopher, shooting a bolt through the back of his head when he turned up.
Brett covered the two bodies with a tarp, hid them in a garage and waited for his younger brother Alexander to show. When he did, he fatally stabbed him with a crossbow bolt.
A third brother Leigh, who lived with his mother, heard the commotion an
