NOT GUILTY was the ver-
dict reached by jurors Friday
in the trial of a North Van-
couver woman accused of
murdering her husband.

Lorraine Degerness had
been charged with second-
degree murder after her hus-
band, Cliff Degerness, died
from a single knife wound to
the heart in an alcohol-
fogged domestic battle
August 22, 1980.

After two days of delibera-
tion a B.C. Supreme Court
jury accepted her defence
that her husband stumbled
and fell on a paring knife she
had been holding.

During the trial, the court

Pump starts fire on

A BOATER who was drain-
ing the gas tank of his boat
Sunday ended up fighting a
fire on it when the pump he
was using ignited the gas
fumes.

The canvas top, top
frame, floorboards and seats
of Eric Lauder’s 16-foot

AS - Wednesday, November 11, 1981 - North Shore News

heard the ‘story of a family

ruined by alcohol.

A former family care
worker, Jacqueline Adair,
told the court she knew
tragedy would hit the family
if steps weren't taken to cure
a history of alcoholism.

“I knew they were
destroying each other,” she
told the court. “They wete
being almost devoured by
alcohol...totally eaten away
by it.”

Degerness told the jury
She only had “flashes” of
memory about the events
leading to her husband's
death.

She told the court she had
picked up a paring knife to

burned as well.

The fire was put out with a
100 Ib. dry chemical ex-
tinguisher before the West
Vancouver Fire Department
arrived.

The reason the fire
started, according to fire
department Inspector Tom

“scare off” her husband after
he had chased her around
the house with a 12-inch
knife, and he either tripped
or stumbled into it.
She said the couple argued
constantly after their two
daughters, aged ll and eight,
were placed in foster homes
in the spring of 1980.
’' When the jury returned
after the first day of
deliberation to say _ it
couldn’t reach a_ verdict,
Justice 8S. Martin Toy urged
the jurors to go back and
reconsider, pointing out it
would be difficult for Mrs.
Degerness to face a second
trial if they couldn't reach a
verdict.

boat

Silverline were damaged in Payne, was that Lauder was
the fire and the boat in the not using an explosion-proof .
next berth had its canvas top pump.

; from: U.B.C. is ber excuse for travelling
whenever she can. She has already visited South America and most of Europe and has
many more trips in mind. (Ellsworth Dickson photo)

KIM’S international, relations degree

Seven years for death of wife

An Aldergrove man was nouned by Justice A. A. Westminster
New Court.

Supreme
sentenced to seven years in Mackoff in

prison Friday for the death
of his estranged wife last
summer.

Douglas Reeves of 5522-
256th St. was found guilty on
a charge of manslaughter,
reduced from an_ earlier
charge of first-degree
murder.

His wife Mary Louise
Brown died in hospital
August 19, 1980 after police,
acting on a tip, found her
locked in the trunk of a car
abandoned acar Aldergrove.
She was suffering from gun-
shot wounds to the head.

The woman had moved to
North Vancouver three
weeks previously from the
Langicy arca.

The sentence was pro

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