Truemors
is reporting from
Member
NP Rank:
NP Rank:
Tori Stafford: Michael Rafferty, Terri-Lynne McClintic Charged
Share:
by Tina Kells | May 20, 2009 at 09:38 am
35816 views | 25 Recommendations | 76 comments
Michael Thomas C.S. Rafferty, 28, and Terri-Lynne McClintic, 18, were arrested May 19, 2009, in the case of missing 8-year old Victoria "Tori" Stafford. Rafferty and McClintic have been charged with abduction and first-degree murder in the case. The pair will be back in court to answer the charges May 28, 2009.
Terri-Lynne McClintic was charged with abducting Tori Stafford and accessory to murder after the fact; McClintic is now believed to be the mysterious woman in the white coat captured on video with Tori the day she went missing (VIDEO). McClintic's boyfriend Michael Rafferty has been charged with both abduction of a person under the age of 16 and first-degree murder.
The unidentified woman last seen with Victoria Stafford is described as between the ages of 19 - 25, of slight build (120-125 pounds), wearing a white coat and black jeans with long black hair. Grainy video footage shows Victoria in the company of this young woman and the little girl does not appear to be in distress.
The fact of a prior relationship between Michael Rafferty and Terri-Lynne McClintic remains unclear but there is speculation that one or both of Tori Stafford's parents knew the couple. Police did not confirm or deny a prior relationship between the defendants and Tori's parents but did concede they were "familiar with one another."
Court documents entered into evidence at the arraignment suggest that Tori was killed on the day of or shortly after her April 8, 2009 abduction.
McClintic, a stocky brunette whose hair was tied in cornrows for her court appearance, also faces charges of helping Rafferty elude authorities.
Rafferty pulled his shirt over his head to cover his face as he was led into the courthouse. He cried during the proceeding, while McClintic was more stoic.
As Rafferty was led by police from the courthouse after his appearance, Tori's uncle Rob Stafford approached him and spat out an expletive.
Rafferty and McClintic next appear in court May 28.
The relationship between the two accused was unclear, but there are reports the pair is known to one or both of Tori's parents.
While Tori Stafford's body has not yet been recovered the charges against Michael Thomas C.S. Rafferty and Terri-Lynne McClintic leave no doubt to the little girl's fate. Police held a press conference May 20, 2009 to discuss the details of the arrests and subsequent abduction and murder charges but few new details were released.
Ontario Provincial Police ask that anybody with additional information on the Tori Stafford abduction and murder case contact Ontario crimestoppers immediately at 1-888-222-TIPS - 1-888-222-8477. OPP have yet to find Tori's body and are asking the public's help in bringing her remains home to her grieving family.
Rafferty was charged with abduction and murder. McClintic was charged with abducting the child, assisting Rafferty in escaping the area and being an accessory to murder after the fact.
The charges leave no doubt as to the fate of the little girl, though neither police nor family have confirmed the child's death. Victoria, known as Tori to her friends and family, has been missing since early April, when she failed to return home after school.
Police have scheduled a news conference for 3 p.m. ET to release more details.
Videos
Little Victoria Stafford went missing after school on April 8, 2009. Images of Tori and an unidentified woman were captured on surveillance video near her school. A massive mobilization of more than 200 volunteers and police officers went out in search of Tori but turned up nothing. Shortly after the abduction the Tori Stafford case was featured on America's Most Wanted.
On Easter Sunday 2009 more than 1,000 people in Tori Stafford's small hometown of Woodstock, Ontario, gathered to hold a candle light vigil praying for her safe return. It appears that the prayers of the community and of Tori's family have gone unanswered. Tori Stafford's mother Tara McDonald began holding press conferences daily in the hopes of keeping her daughter's name in the media.
The news of Tori Stafford's kidnapping and murder by a couple, Michael Rafferty and Terri-Lynne McClintic, has haunting shades of the 1987-1988 murder spree of Paul Bernardo and Karla Hamolka, which also happened in the Canadian province of Ontario.
The phenomena of couples who abduct and kill is a rare, yet well studied area of forensic psychology. The pathology of abduct-and-kill couples and pairs is similar in all known cases and if Rafferty and McClintic turn out to be sex offenders they will be the second to strike in Ontario in the past 25 years. If Tori Stafford is their only victim it may be because they were caught early on and she was their first.
What is NowPublic?
NowPublic lets people work together to cover news events around the world.
Most Recommended Comment
Crowd Power
Jordan Yerman
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Tina Kells
Vancouver, Canada
Related Stories
Recommendations (25)
Blue Crush
Toronto, Canada
Rhonda J Mangus
North Tonawanda, New York, United States
SamirJ
Vadodara, Gujarat, India
Anonymous users (3)
Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (76)
at 10:56 on May 20th, 2009
Now!!! Don't you think the parents will start talking???? God help them!!
at 11:32 on May 20th, 2009
It isnt about anything to do with the Dad (Rodney)..he has been working on getting his life together and is a decent person... I always felt it had soemthing to do with or someone that knew mom... more like the druggie people her mom knows and her new spouse. poor Tori.. it was always about her and what happpened to her. sick man that did this to her and his teenage girlfriend..sounds like a karla and Paul story all over again. WTF is wrong with people...sick bastards..
I heard from someone that worked with the girl who was arrested she was into meth and I think her own family said she had found trouble and bad people a few yrs back, well obviosuly recently too. sad. 18 and has messed up life now. I dont know how she can live with herself aiding to the murder of the little precious girl for her bf.. prob sexually motivated also. I read that somewhere too. sad day indeed. we hoped she would come home alive........to her daddy
at 13:03 on May 20th, 2009
my god , i knew terrilynn when she was a child AND her mother carol. Carol abused terrilynn and did drugs constantly. I cant believe this i havent seen her for a couple years. They both lived in our hometown of mactier ontario. Jesus it makes me feel sick to think...
our whole hometown feels sick. Its astounding she would have done this. I would have never thought. Jesus. Damn carol , damn the system that failed and i hope this never happens again.
at 14:18 on May 20th, 2009
Aparently Michael has priors and a woman in toronto has a restarining order against him.. This guy was a time bomb.. So discusted with this entire thing.. It makes me sick to my stomach and its cases like this were i wish Canada had the death penalty!
at 14:27 on May 20th, 2009
I say take a sick horse out to pasture and shoot it.
at 07:43 on May 22nd, 2009
I agree, kill the sick horse. He's no good to anyone after the decisions he's made, not society and not himself, so KILL him!
He took the life of an eight year old...is there a reason he is kept alive? There are SEVEN BILLION PEOPLE-- if we killed all the sickos then there would be enough food for everyone to eat!
at 04:34 on June 1st, 2009
The death penalty is not a punishment. The person receiving the death feels little to no pain, and the fear they experience prior is of little consequence to them (sometimes even gets them off). The only people who are affected by death as a punishment, are those in society who fear being put to death. It has NO IMPACT on true sociopaths. It is pointless waste of time. AND there is not one legal system the world over that has not made erroneous judgements. ONE wrongly convicted person being put to death is worse than a trillion murders being put to death.
Death is the easy option, chances are, after several years on death row, most of them WANT their 2 mins of fame with a final curtain call.
We need to rethink the society that enables children to be exposed to lifestyles of abuse, drugs and hardship and then our communities need to take responsibility for all of its people.
Perhaps then we will dream up a punitive system where the family's of victums ONLY excecute the justice they feel best fits the situation. Im sorry if you disagree, but no system, government or any other group of people or individual has the right to punish anyone else. Only the victims (and their family's) have that right. An eye for an eye was only ever meant to be dished out by those affected by the crime. As much as we all sit on our keyboards saying how terrible this is and how it has shocked us, each and everyone of us has NO IDEA of the impact of this behaviour without experiencing it first hand.
Look over your fence in the morning, and ask yourself, do those kids look like they had breakfast, is there any support I can offer to help them become a more close knit family.
I personnally believe that the key to most of the volence that has permeated out society, comes from the break down of the family unit. There was a time when people actually worked hard on a relationship and making it work. Nowdays its so easy to just up and move on to the next relationship in the hope that we will get what we want for ourselves. What about the children? What about their right to be raised in a warm loving caring enviroment with BOTH male and female role models?
Hmmm I could carry on for ages, but it changes nothing, still the world will turn and tomorrow thousands upon thousands of children will die world wide due to the callous and stupid 'monkey' like decisions of adults.. Well done humanity! pffffttt
at 04:50 on June 1st, 2009
Heily, I don't know if you are aware of this...
but there is already enough food produced on this planet to feed everyone all year round and still feed our animals too.... so you do the math,
The only reason people starve, is because someone somewhere has stood someone else over and said "MINE" theft, greed and intimidation are the reasons people starve and are poor. Most of the poorest nations in the world were the most minerally rich countries, it has been the expoiltation of fundamentalist globalist capitalists ( oh hail our god the monetry system that will never fail us!) that have ensured the populations of those nations are now completely enslaved by DEBT! and have had to sell of their mineral wealth at dimes in the dollar in exchange for.... another load at 5.6% interest.
Do some research before mouthing off.
I agree with the death of sociopaths without a doubt, but i disagree that you or anyone BUT THE VICTIM"S family have the right to do it. And by your own god, you better be right because if your wrong and you do execute someone.....theres going to be another family ready to fry your ass too.
We all knock the muslims and their punitive system and call it barbaric, but it seems to me that at least the family's get their revenge in muslim society ( not withstanding the MANY thousands of family's that choose to forgive perpertrators )
at 21:17 on June 24th, 2009
he is being kept alive because they still need to find her body, and only he & Terri know where they dumped it. But after they find it, with or without his help, i agree that they should definitely be killed. both of them.
at 22:03 on July 21st, 2009
Good one hailey998! I'm also sick of these creeps and cold-hearted murderers getting life in prison or off on a plea bargin! Just torch them all... that's what I'd do if it were up to me. I'm sure there are others that feel the same...
at 15:23 on May 20th, 2009
Hang the bastard...........
at 15:54 on May 20th, 2009
I know it was a young girl, but everyone has to remember that she's not the only one that's been murdered. Everyday children go missing, children are being rapped, children are being killed... Half of the missing cases, are never solved. At least they know that there daughter is up there in Heaven, instead of being rapped daily or even worse, she's now put to rest and her parents can have the free mind of knowing that she's still not out there being tortured.
To all of you out there, let this be a lesson, that there are sick people out there. Life isn't easy and full of sane people.
You guys want them to be killed for what they've done? If we kill all the murderers in the world, are we not murderers are selves?
If you say that the girl was being abused by her mother, then how come no one did anything to save that girl? By saving her, you could have saved Tori.... so I'd rethink something you guys are all saying.
at 19:27 on May 20th, 2009
Are you absoluetly insane? How can what you have said be of any support for Tori's parents and brother. You have obviously never suffered a tramatic loss in your life or you would have to know what you are saying is just plain IGNORANT...
at 15:57 on June 2nd, 2009
Support? For her parents and brother.....? Her brother and father yes, but her mother...give me a break! What kind of parent tells the media that if Terri-Lynn had a dog with her then victoria would have gone with her because she loves animals? WTF? My daughter is 4 and we already have a password system! I don't get why EVERYBODY is so quick to believe that these two people killed victoria when nobody knows anything! We know of no eviedence...nothing. Police can charge a person all they want with very little eviedence (in this case Terri-Lynn's confession) but the conviction is an etirely different story. It will be interesting to see if this case even goes to trial with no eviedence, no motive, no body, and no murder weapon. The mother was looked at for a reason for 6 entire weeks....but wait...some crack head has confessed so the mother is off the hook now...please!!! A family memeber...who I know personally...has said that they believe Tori's mother is not innocient! So maybe you should think before you mouth off to others. And before you even think it...I have suffered a tramatic loss..so you don't need to use that point in your response...as I'm sure you will have one.
at 13:29 on June 6th, 2009
She said the animals thing b/c she was trying to think of any reason that Tori would willingly follow somebody. She didn't mean it in a negative way; if you were in her position and you saw your daughter was being taken away by someone wouldn't you wonder why she went? and don't say it can't happen; children are innocent and helpless, Tori didn't know any better, especially since Terri-Lynn was a women... yo place yourself in Tori's mum's position; if you had just lost your daughter, and people made accusations it was you but wasn't, how would you feel? it's her little angel... don't make accusations if YOU yourself have NO evidence. Okay a family member said it, big deal. My own family doesn't even know me that well, family doesn't mean you KNOW the person, sure you're related but that doesn't mean you know what's true.The police chose to arrest two sick people, and I know evidence will soon be found. They're sick, and deserve to be tortured every single day for the rest of their lives. May Tori Rest In Peace, she was adorable and didn't deserve this... neither do any of the children that this happens to on a daily basis... RIP baby girl. And as for you, keep your opinion to yourself, please. Because nobody needs your negativity, I'm getting upset and I don't even know you sick women!
at 04:22 on May 21st, 2009
Ok lady, calm yourself!
at 11:26 on June 8th, 2009
We are not murders for killing Child Predators...we are protecting the children from becoming prey. If a dog or wild animal attackes and bites your child what are you going to do? Shoot it? That is right so to me to killing a child predator is protecting our children and the children of the future.Think of how may molestors there are out there abusing our children...we need to help them cause they are too small to protect themselves. I wish we could just put a pea sized GPS in our children from birth to if they go missing we can bring them home safe and sound where they belong. Not find them cold, alone and in pain in a ditch or shallow grave. God gives us the power and we are stupid to not use it!
May Tori rest in peace and be beside her family at this very hard time. Maybe everytime they see a butterfly they will know it is her making sure that they are ok!
at 16:07 on May 20th, 2009
These 2 waste's of space are now going to become a further burden on the rest of the productive, tax paying society. I say let them out into the public and let nature take it's course. I'm sure now that they are exposed, they would only have a brief time left until someone or a mob took care of the problem.
at 16:10 on May 20th, 2009
PEOPLE need to realize that these two individuals are INNOCENT until PROVEN GUILTY in a court of law. Any further speculation regarding this case can cause problems for the Law Enforecement agencies whom are tryin to prosecute it. Also my personal feeling is htey have the wrong person they said the person was 120 to 125 pounds this women they arrested is about 175 or so its impossible to gain 50 pounds in 6 weeks. Maybe they have the wrong people.
at 16:47 on May 20th, 2009
This is true and entirely possible ie: Guy Paul Morin. However if they are indeed guilty, their souls will be payment enough .. and their is nothing a mere earthly court can do to stop it.
at 16:55 on May 20th, 2009
NO- Obviously you have no kids and have not been alive long enough to know about the past escapdes in Ontario.
There are no laws and restrictions on people that are this violent and psychotic.
Offenders go unnoticed until they actually commit a crime. STOP THEM NOW!!!!
my duaghter was almost abducted last year but had the sense enough to get a make model and plate and good desciption of the perp BUT until he acutally sexually offended someone- was he charged.
One person has been arrested for murder, the other as accesory- GUILT GUILT GUILT.
No time for trial- throw them into the din and let them have their way. Only because the public is unable to inflict the retributions that are deserving of such people.
Let's not make the same mistake as years ago= they should both be resopnsible and serve life in prison.
A child is gone and murdered, someone that never knew what sick bastards there are in this world.
Did Bernardo and Homolka not teach us something?
There is no tolerance and we need to stand firm that this will not be tolerated in our society!!!~!
at 15:49 on May 22nd, 2009
I cannot agree with you more...I still have nightmares about what happened Christin and Lesley, and Karla's sister...I feel like Bernardo and Homolka got away with it...I mean what really has been done to them...She's out enjoying her life, having children (a daughter I think)...He's being looked after, protected even (paid for by us)...I would vote for the death penalty if I were given the chance...I hope that both the woman and the man in this case get the maximum penalty under the law (although it will still not be enough)...It is with my greatest sympathy I send my thoughts and prayers to Tori's family...
at 19:25 on July 26th, 2009
EXACTLY.
at 18:05 on May 20th, 2009
the girl was taken in on a different charge (outstanding warrant) and she has confessed this murder on her own and is helping the police find the girl's body. This alone is more than sufficient proof that they have the right people.
at 04:30 on May 21st, 2009
What else did she say happened? ANyone know? Was it sexually motivated? and why kill her?
at 16:02 on June 2nd, 2009
Or Terri-Lynn is crack head who wants her 15 minutes of fame. Did you see the video of her arriving at the courthouse? She could care less where she was or what she says she did. I think it's all a load of crap. I think they have the wrong people. And it scares me to death that Victoria could still be alive somewhere but becuase the police are so focused on the statements of Terri-Lynn, she will never be found. Why do people give up so easily?
at 19:18 on May 20th, 2009
I agree with you. I know terri lynne personally and I have NEVER known her to be over 125 pounds she was always tiny. MAYBE she did do it. But I don't beleive that is terri that is in custody! I could be wrong but I think that something is screwed right up!!!!!!!
at 02:26 on May 21st, 2009
HTML clipboardCM, what made you think that the accused isn't Terri? Is that really her or not? I've been reading the texts, something sounds fishy here. Lets not all judge, remember innocent until proven guilty. We do not know the facts, only what we have heard from others.
at 18:40 on May 21st, 2009
I completely agree; innocent until proven guilty. We have no proof to say that these two people are, in fact, guilty of anything. Unless these people that are writing in about the death sentence are getting their information from a secret paper/source that I don't know about, there is nothing to tell us why these people are even suspects other then this 18yr old taking the police on a wild goose chase (which we don't know much about either!)
Something really does sound fishy about this whole story. My boyfriend and I were talking about it and were arguing about the different stories we had heard. So, in trying to prove him wrong, I have just read over 10 different articles about Tori's abduction and I just can't wrap my head around her apparent death. Did this 18 yr old actually confess to the murder because i never heard or read that until someone wrote it in one of these threads. I also don't understand how people can be charge with murder when there is no evidence of death at all. I know we don't know everything and the police are not saying a whole lot but to me it's just a really odd story and a lot of things just aren't adding up...
at 09:38 on May 22nd, 2009
Omg do u not watch the news , if they are not guilty why is she trying to help the police now find the body , they did it hang both of them i'm sick of working and paying for these bastards to sit in jail and not have any kind of punchiment I say we bring back public hangings so we can all have a good seat. Or pump diseases into them use them a an experiment for cures instead of inoccent amimals.