Mounties recall finding slain man

As soon as West Shore RCMP Const. Daryl McDonald opened the door of Martin Payne’s home in Metchosin, he saw a large amount of blood on the floor.

McDonald had been asked to do a welfare check on Payne. The 60-yearold provincial government mail carrier had missed three days of work and had not responded to calls from concerned co-workers and family members.

So on the morning of July 12, 2019, Staff Sgt. Raj Sandhu made the decision that officers should enter Payne’s home on Brookview Drive. A locksmith arrived and McDonald and Cpl. Hayden Barrow entered Payne’s home.

“I simply looked at Cpl. Barrow and we looked at each other. … We knew something was up. It wasn’t normal,” McDonald testified Thursday at James Busch’s murder trial at the Vancouver Law Courts.

Busch has pleaded not guilty to the first-degree murder of Payne. His co-accused Zachary Armitage is now “being dealt with in a separate way” and is no longer present at the trial.

McDonald testified that he said “police” in a loud voice but got no answer. He saw blood to the left and followed it to the main bedroom.

“The door was open and there was a comforter or duvet on the floor,” McDonald testified. “There was a large amount of blood. Beside the comforter was a couple of black garbage bags.”

He lifted up one of the bags and looked inside. It was filled with towels and bedding.

A door on the right side of bedroom was closed. With all the blood, McDonald testified, he wondered if Payne had injured himself in his workshop and gone into the bathroom.

“I opened the door and Mr. Payne was on the ground. His head was towards the toilet. He was face down and his head was turned. There was a large amount of blood on the floor and there was some duct tape on his leg,” McDonald testified.

He said he and Barrow went out the door, locked it and notified the Vancouver Island Integrated Major Crime Unit.

McDonald had a short conversation with Payne’s sister Colleen, who had come to the house to check on her brother and was waiting in her car.

“I don’t recall what I said, but essentially I relayed that he was deceased. I didn’t give her any details. She left eventually.”

Barrow testified Thursday that he received a call from major crime unit investigator Jason Kerr, who wanted to know if they had cleared the house.

Because they “foolishly” had not checked to see if there was anyone else inside, they went back in and went through the rest of the house, Barrow testified.

“The bedrooms were mostly empty. We looked in the closets, the bathroom, the shower and tub area,” said McDonald.

“I did notice a large knife and hatchet in the bathroom. I didn’t disturb them at all, just noted it.”

They stayed at the scene until other officers arrived.

McDonald testified that he drove back to the office and went to a briefing about what they had found.

During cross-examination by Busch’s defence lawyer Ryan Drury, Barrow agreed that he had changed the evidence he gave Thursday from the evidence he had given at a preliminary hearing in May 2021.

Barrow explained that he had not had the opportunity to review photographs of the crime scene or minutes of the meetings he had attended before testifying at the preliminary inquiry last year.

Melanie Bishop, security intelligence officer at William Head penitentiary, was also on the stand. She testified that she had dealings with both Busch and Armitage while they were at the prison, before and after they escaped.

She identified Busch in the courtroom, telling prosecutor Sofia Bakken that he looks “extremely” different than he did at William Head.

“He has lost weight. He’s thinner. He has long hair. He was always bald in the institution,” Bishop testified. “He looked much harder and angry when he was at William Head.”