B.C. Appeal Court orders new trial after setting aside murder conviction

The B.C. Court of Appeal has set aside Adrianus Johannes Rosbergen’s second-degree murder conviction and ordered a new trial, finding errors in the trial judge’s instructions to the jury.

Rosbergen, then 82, was convicted in December 2024 in the February 2017 death of Allen Skedden. He received the mandatory life sentence for murder, with parole eligibility after 12 years. Skedden’s body was found on a rocky bank along the Fraser River in Richmond on March 2, 2017.

Justice Margot L. Fleming, writing for a three-judge panel, found the trial judge materially misstated the evidence of a forensic pathologist. The pathologist said Skedden’s cause of death was undetermined and that suffocation was a possibility, not likely. The appeal court concluded the jury had been encouraged to rely on the inaccurate summary in deciding whether the Crown had proved murder beyond a reasonable doubt.

The court also found the jury was not adequately warned about the reliability of key Crown witness Richard Anderson. Anderson testified that Rosbergen made incriminating statements to him, but the appeal decision said no other Crown evidence corroborated that account. The defence had raised Anderson’s criminal history and past dishonesty with police.

The B.C. Prosecution Service said it is assessing whether the charge assessment standard remains met. Prosecutors must be satisfied there is a substantial likelihood of conviction and that continuing the prosecution is in the public interest.