Accused killer had nomadic childhood, grandfather testifies
The grandfather of accused killer Gregory Allan Despres, 24, testified Thursday that the young man has lived a nomadic existence nearly his entire life.
Adolph Despres, 76, told the court that Despres spent his childhood bouncing between his mother's and father's homes in Fredericton, Chipman and Minto before dropping out of school in New Brunswick and moving to New Bedford, Mass.
The elder Despres said his grandson moved back to New Brunswick about six years ago, occasionally inhabiting a travel trailer on a small lot of land on Slope Road in Minto, right next door to well-known country musician Fred Fulton and his wife, Verna Decarie.
The younger Despres is now on trial for first-degree murder in the stabbing deaths of Fulton, 74, and Decarie, 70 on April 23, 2005. Fulton's daughter discovered the bloody bodies in their home three days after they died. Fulton had been beheaded.
Despres has pleaded not guilty to both crimes and his trial is in its fourth day.
On April 24, Despres crossed the St. Stephen-Calais border and was arrested the next day wandering along the highway in Massachusetts. The courts in New Brunswick had issued a warrant for his arrest after he failed to show in court to be sentenced for threatening and assaulting Fulton's grandson.
Despres is a naturalized U.S. citizen.
The elder Despres, a retired pipefitter and construction worker, told the court he bought the lot next door to Fulton for $4,000, moved a travel trailer onto the property and intended to build a tool shed there.
He said Gregory sometimes stayed in the trailer, or at his father's house, and often took showers at his home, a few minute's drive from the lot.
He said the two "were buddies" and he often drove Gregory around where he wanted to go. They often worked on cars together, and Despres made a bedroom available for Gregory at his home, for use if he wanted. He said his grandson was building himself a car.
"I couldn't even touch his car, put my hammer on it. It was precious," he recalled, smiling.
Despres said the day of the deaths, Gregory visited in the afternoon to take a shower and then got a ride back to the Slope Road lot, stopping at a bank machine to pick up some cash, saying he was going to a party.
Despres told the court that he intended to take his grandson to the Burton Court for his sentencing hearing at 9 a.m. on Monday, but couldn't find him at the trailer or in the shed.
"My daughter had to go to work, and I was supposed to take him to the court, so she went on there before I did. There was nobody there."
The trial continues Thursday afternoon.