Man guilty of second-degree murder in death of Adrienne McColl

Adrienne McColl is shown in this police handout image. (Credit: RCMP)

CALGARY -

It took two hours for a Calgary jury to determine that Stephane Parent was guilty of second-degree murder in the death of his girlfriend Adrienne McColl in 2002.

That was the decision released following the murder trial that was originally supposed to occur in 2020, but it had to be postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Parent, 53, was charged 16 years after McColl's body was found in a farmer's field near Nanton, Alta., on Feb. 18, 2002, four days after she went missing.

At the time of the investigation, police said their focus remained on Parent, but there was never enough evidence to lay charges.

The case went cold after he left the province, buying a one-way ticket to Ottawa shortly after the murder took place.

Investigators continued working on the case and, when new forensic technologies became available, he was arrested in Quebec in 2018.

Stephane Parent is seen in this missing persons poster that was issued near the time of McColl's death in 2002.

He was charged with second-degree murder and sent back to Calgary shortly afterward.

Parent applied for a Jordan ruling in the case, which makes a determination about whether or not a conviction can be made in a reasonable amount of time, but was denied.

His sentencing date is not immediately known.