Thirty years after Dean Roberts murdered his wife, twin babies, he's behind a class-action lawsuit over COVID-19 isolation in prison

2020 Charter breaches alleged by man who strangled his wife, smothered one baby, lit house on fire killing second baby and almost a stepson in 1994

A man who planned and carried out the murder of his wife, twin babies then burned his house to the ground almost killing his sleeping stepson complains that COVID-19 pandemic isolation measures at federal prisons weren’t fair.

In an application to certify a class action lawsuit against the Government of Canada, the unapologetic triple murderer said the measures put in place at Mission Institution in March  2020 amounted to “inhumane rights restrictions” because he was denied “meaningful human interaction” for extended periods of time.

Roberts argues that since he and other inmates were confined to cells for up to 22 hours a day, that was a form of lockdown equal to solitary confinement, a practice no longer permitted in Canada precisely because of successful lawsuits by inmates such as Roberts. 

His prospective case first filed in April 2020 suggests this was a violation of sections 7 and 12 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In a decision in Vancouver on May 30, 2025, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Michael Tammen agreed to certify the class action, concluding that while the merits of the case are uncertain, that should be decided at trial.

What’s he in for?

Explaining in detail what Dean Christopher Roberts did in Cranbrook 31 years ago, I note that it isn’t legally or practically relevant to the class-action lawsuit against pandemic restrictions in Canadian prisons. I’m going to explain it anyway because while defenders of civil liberties may argue otherwise, I believe context here is important.

For the same reason lawyers for offenders convicted of crimes rightly want their upbringing and life experiences taken into consideration at sentencing hearings, the public should know – and will certainly be interested in – the index offence of a man who continues to force the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars (maybe millions) because of his various litigation over the years.

Before Roberts began the plot that would put him behind bars for life, the 26-year-old put a $200,000 life insurance policy on his 24-year-old wife, Susan.

The couple lived in Cranbrook with their twin 14-month-old baby boys, David and Josiah, and a stepson, Susan’s son from a previous relationship.

After dinner together on July 18, 1994, Susan was tired, he would later recount, so they put the kids to bed. She went to bed early and Dean was going to go to a friend’s house as he often did. Before doing that, he went to the bedroom and started giving Susan a massage.

“Ah relaxing her, her neck and her shoulders,” he said according to a transcript of his conversation with an undercover police officer in September 1994. “And in the process of giving her the massage, I manoeuvred the rope underneath her neck, and double knotted it, and put my knee into the back of her head.”

That transcript read out in court and included in the decision against him was part of the classic “Mr. Big” scheme. Investigative agencies across North America have used this for decades and still, amazingly, it sometimes works. This is the undercover plot whereby an officer or officers pose as gangsters to lure an investigative target into confessing a crime to who the target thinks are fellow criminals.

Roberts told an undercover officer at a motel in September 1994 that he had tried to kill his wife more than once before he was successful.

“I had thought of everything,” he said to the officer. 

“I tried three times, to ah, put together some kind of a poison out of byproduct and I had found what, larkspur and ah, monk's root, which are natural um, plants in the Kootenays that are poisonous by nature, and I put some of it in the soup and she got really sick once, and she got kind of a mild.... It wasn't strong enough.”

Roberts was obviously under investigation as a suspect in the homicides, but he had hoped he created enough of an alibi in the way he committed the crime and being at a friend’s house when the bodies were discovered.

“Really?” the officer responded.

“And that's how the killing was done,” Roberts said.

After his wife was dead, he took his baby son Josiah and smothered him to death, put him in a bag, set the house on fire, and left. Firefighters were able to get the blaze out before the older adopted boy who was sleeping upstairs succumbed. His wife was found dead in the house and his son, David, was comatose. 

David died on July 24, 1994, at Vancouver Children’s Hospital. 

The body of Josiah, the other twin, was found on July 20, 1994, in a wooded area near the house. 

The above might muddy the waters in terms of coming to an honest conclusion about how inmates should be treated in Canadian prisons. But we can’t unring this bell. Now you know what Dean Christopher Roberts did on July 18, 1994. Keep that in mind when considering what got him to a place on May 30, 2025 where he is given a voice to litigate his complaint about criminal offenders getting lonely in the pandemic.

The class action

Dean Roberts is the representative plaintiff in what is now a class-action lawsuit against the Government of Canada, represented by the attorney general of Canada, related to the treatment of prison inmates incarcerated in federal institutions during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Specifically, the proceeding is connected to medical isolation practices in various institutions during the height of the pandemic. 

“The plaintiff claims that the result of the medical isolation policies and practices of the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) was that a large number of federal inmates were subject to inhumane rights restrictions, a form of ‘lockdown’ amounting to solitary confinement, in which they were confined to their cells for up to 22 hours a day and denied any meaningful human interaction for an extended period of time.”

That is how some people in some prisons experienced parts of the pandemic and it might sound a little like the experiences of many housebound individuals, elderly people in seniors’ homes, single remote workers.

Any person incarcerated in CSC institutions during the pandemic who were confined to their cells for 20 hours or more for 15 or more consecutive days are part of the class action.

To prevent the spread of COVID among inmates, men at Mission Institution were isolated in their cells only allowed out for 20 minutes at a time to shower or call family members.

"Within the first month of solitary confinement some men were showing me, [as] I went door to door, where they had developed bed sores and body pain from being sedentary and lying in bed all day," he wrote in an affidavit filed in B.C. Supreme Court.

Roberts argues the treatment of inmates violates the Nelson Mandela Rules, the United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, which addresses the 22-hour limit and meaningful contact with other persons.

"I cannot stress enough that worse than the solitary confinement was the absence of routine. On any given day staff seemed to invent a new routine for showers and phone calls. We were left in our cages anxious, worried, angry what the day would bring and when would relief come."

The plaintiff, the attorney general, said the case should not be certified because medical isolation was different than solitary confinement in that it was necessary as health officials came to terms with how to deal with the fast-spreading virus. Medical isolation at CSC institutions was informed by medical advice, as it was in hospitals, seniors’ homes, etc.

The timeframe complained about by Roberts, who is the chair on the inmate wellness committee at Mission, is not even two months. From April 2 to 7, 2020, Mission was in total lockdown with all inmates confined to cells around the clock. 

Roberts was in the institution for all of April except for four days because, wait for it, he was at Mission Memorial Hospital being treated for COVID-19.

“It is not seriously disputed that, although Mission was declared COVID-19 free by mid-May, 2020, significant restrictions, with very limited out-of-cell time, continued until mid-July, 2020,” according to Justice Tammen’s written ruling.

How CSC dealt with the pandemic was somewhat haphazard, maybe understandably given it was new to everyone in the world and the agency deals with housing convicted criminals. 

CSC was managing its response on an ad hoc basis, forming an emergency operations committee whenever there was an outbreak. 

“Beginning in the spring of 2020, CSC, in consultation with public health officials, developed algorithms or flow charts to guide institutional management decisions regarding when and for how long inmates should be placed on medical isolation. The algorithms were fluid and there were more than 60 iterations from March 2020 through 2023.”

As with every other area of society in Canada, it was a hot mess and no one knew what to do or how long it would last.

The attorney general (AG) does not dispute that at various institutions, at different times, there were widespread restrictions in place which amounted to the type of conditions described above by the inmates. The AG simply says the decisions to confine non-symptomatic inmates to cells for prolonged periods of isolation were medically mandated by interpretation of the algorithms and based on input from practices at other institutions and policy guidelines from CSC national headquarters, guidelines that changed over time.

This civil claim was actually filed in April 2020 during Mission’s first outbreak. The original claims were “broad and vast,” and were pared down until the hearing of the motion to certify in fall 2023. A fifth amended notice was filed mid-hearing in October 2024, which had the plaintiff abandon all causes of action other than negligence and breaches of section 7 and 12 of the charter.

The AG argued that a class action is not the way to proceed, and that indivdual plaintiffs should bring their own action based on negligence or alleged Charter breaches.

“Moreover, AG Canada submits that the proposed common issues trial is unwieldy and unmanageable, and the common issues will inevitably be overwhelmed by the required individual issues and inquires.”

In the end, Justice Tammen agreed to certify the class action making it clear that his decision is not an endorsement of the claim, rather, he concluded, the case should be decided at trial.

Unapologetic killer

While it’s clear that Roberts murdered his wife and his twin baby sons and tried to murder his step-son, he’s been filing claims in court ever since.

On Nov. 2, 1995, a jury found him guilty of three counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder. He was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years. That 25 years, coincidentally, ended the first year of the pandemic, but parole is impossible to receive if an offender doesn’t take responsibility for crimes.

He lost an appeal of the convictions at the B.C. Court of Appeal, and did not file an appeal with the Supreme Court of Canada. He may have exhausted all ways to appeal his convictions but in 2017 he attempted to get evidence from the case for modern DNA testing. But in 2018, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Arne Silverman declined to order DNA testing, leaving Roberts to appeal to the federal justice minister to do so if he or she agrees to a review.

In 2021, he was granted the right to ask for a ministerial review of his case, to get the evidence to do DNA testing.

Unsurprisingly, like all murderers caught in a Mr. Big sting, he recanted, claiming he was scared of the undercover officer, the fake “Mr. Big.”

Since 2009, Roberts has pursued his case with the University of British Columbia's Innocence Project.

The courts certainly have not heard the last from this triple killer.

-30-

Want to support independent journalism?
Consider becoming a paid subscriber or make a one-time donation so I can continue this work.

Paul J. Henderson
pauljhenderson@gmail.com
facebook.com/PaulJHendersonJournalist
instagram.com/wordsarehard_pjh
x.com/PeeJayAitch
wordsarehard-pjh.bsky.social