Pan, Mylvaganam, Wong, Crawford: Life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 25 years Carty: 9-to-18 years in prison (died before completing sentence)
On November 8, 2010, police in Markham, Ontario, Canada, a suburb outside of Toronto, responded to a report of a robbery and assault at the Unionville home of Hann and Bich Pan, ethnically Chinese Vietnamese immigrants. Both had been shot repeatedly; Bich died of her injuries and Hann was permanently blinded. The investigation revealed that the crime was not a robbery but instead a kill-for-hire orchestrated by the couple's daughter Jennifer Pan (born June 17, 1986). She had expected to inherit her parents' money and was angered that they had forbidden her to see her boyfriend after they discovered she had been deceiving them about her education.
At trial, Pan was found guilty on multiple charges and sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 25 years, the same penalty as her co-conspirators. In May 2023, the Court of Appeal for Ontario ordered a retrial for Pan and her conspirators on the first-degree murder charge but upheld the attempted murder conviction. It is still not clear who actually fired the shots.
Early life and education
Jennifer Pan's mother, Bich Ha Pan (pronounced "Bick"),[note 2] and father, Huei Hann Pan,[note 3] were ethnic Chinese refugees from Vietnam (Viet Hoa) to Canada.[3] Hann was born and educated in Vietnam, moving to Canada in 1979 as a refugee. Bich also came to Canada as a refugee. The couple were married in Toronto and lived in Scarborough. Jennifer was born in 1986, and her brother Felix in 1989.[4][5] The Pans found work at Magna International, an auto parts manufacturer in Aurora.[4] Hann worked as a tool and die maker, while Bich made car parts. By 2004, Hann and Bich purchased a house with a two-car garage on a residential street in Markham, a city in the Greater Toronto Area with a large Asian population.[6]
Jennifer's parents set many goals for their children and were said to have had extremely high expectations of them. Jennifer was made to take music theory and harmony lessons at the age of 12, as well as figure skating classes, where she trained most days of the week. Her aspirations to become an Olympic figure skating champion ended when she tore a knee ligament. At Mary Ward Catholic Secondary School, Jennifer played flute in the school band.[4] According to her high school friend Karen K. Ho, Hann was seen as "the classic tiger dad," and Bich was "his reluctant accomplice." The Pans picked Jennifer up at the end of school each day and closely monitored her extracurricular activities. They never permitted her to date while attending high school or attend dances, out of fear that these activities would distract from her academic commitments. Jennifer was not permitted to attend any parties during the time her parents believed she was at university. At 22, "she had never gone to a club, been drunk, visited a friend's cottage or gone on vacation without her family."[4] Jennifer and her friends reportedly regarded this upbringing as restrictive and greatly oppressive.[4]
Despite her parents' expectations that Jennifer receive good grades in lower school, in high school they were somewhat average (in the 70% range) except for music. By forging report cards, she deceived her parents into thinking she earned straight As. When Jennifer failed calculus class in grade 12, Ryerson University (now Toronto Metropolitan University) rescinded her early admission. As she could not bear to be perceived as a failure, she began to lie to those she knew, including her parents, and pretended she was attending university. Instead, she sat in cafés, taught piano and worked in a restaurant to earn money. In order to maintain the charade, Jennifer told her parents she had won scholarships, later falsely claiming that she had accepted an offer into the pharmacology program at the University of Toronto. She went to the extent of purchasing second-hand textbooks and watching videos related to pharmacology in order to create notebooks full of purported class notes she could show her parents.[4]
Jennifer also requested permission from her parents to stay near campus with a friend (actually her high school[4][6] boyfriend, Daniel Chi-Kwong Wong,[note 4][8] who later transferred to Cardinal Carter Academy in North York due to low grades) during the week. Wong, of mixed Chinese and Filipino ancestry, lived in Ajax.[6][9][10] He was an active marijuana dealer and managed a Boston Pizza.[4][11][12]
Adult life
While pretending to study at Ryerson, Jennifer told her parents that she had started working as a volunteer at The Hospital for Sick Children. Hann and Bich soon became suspicious when they realized she did not have a hospital ID badge or uniform. Bich followed her daughter to "work" and quickly discovered her deception. Greatly angered, Hann wanted to throw Jennifer out of the house, but Bich persuaded him to allow her to stay. As she had not completed high school, she eventually began working to finish high school and was later encouraged by her parents to apply to university. She was, however, forbidden to contact Wong due to his parents being from different ethnic backgrounds (according to Jennifer), or to go anywhere except for her piano-teaching job. The two still remained in discreet contact.[4]
By 2009, Wong had grown weary of trying to pursue a relationship with her because of the restrictions imposed on Jennifer by her parents. Wong broke off the relationship and began to date another woman.[4] After learning of this new relationship, Jennifer falsely informed Wong that a man had entered her house, showing what appeared to be a police badge, after which several men rushed in and gang-raped her. She claimed that after this a bullet was mailed to her, and that both of these events were orchestrated by Wong's new girlfriend.[4]
Attack on the Pan household
In spring 2010, Jennifer was in contact with Andrew Montemayor, a high school friend who, she claims, had boasted of robbing people at knifepoint (which he denies). He introduced her to Ricardo Duncan, a "goth kid," to whom Jennifer claims she paid $1,500 to kill her father in the parking lot at his workplace. Duncan said that she once gave him $200 for a night out, but he returned it, and rebuffed her entreaty to kill her parents.[4]
Jennifer and Wong were back in contact at this time and, according to the police, came up with a plan to hire a professional hitman for $10,000, calculating that she would then inherit $500,000. They planned to move in together. Wong connected Pan with[4] Lenford Roy Crawford,[10] a Jamaican-born man,[13] and gave her a SIM card and iPhone so that she could contact Crawford without using her usual cell phone.[4] Crawford in turn contacted another man,[14] Eric Shawn "Sniper" Carty, from Rexdale,[15] who in turn contacted Montreal-born David Mylvaganam.[14][3] At trial, the Crown (prosecution) argued Mylvaganam was one of the hitmen.[14] Carty was later convicted of an unrelated 2009 murder.[1]
The murder took place at the Pan house in Markham's Unionville neighbourhood.[16] On November 8, 2010, Pan unlocked the front door of the family home when she went to bed, then spoke by phone to Mylvaganam. Shortly afterward, Mylvaganam and two other people entered the home through the front door, all armed.[4] In the court testimony, the Crown did not establish the identity of the other two hitmen; Wong and Crawford were at work.[14]
Carty stated that he was the driver for those who broke into the house; he also selected them and was involved in plotting the attack.[1] The identity of the triggerman remains unknown.[1]
After demanding all of the money in the house and ransacking the main bedroom, the three men took Bich and Hann to the basement and shot them several times. Bich died, and Hann survived. The three men then took $2,000 from Pan and left. Pan claimed that they tied her up, but she managed to dial 9-1-1.[4] Hann was treated at Markham Stouffville Hospital,[17] before being moved to a trauma unit[18] at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto,[19] by air.[18]
Investigation and arrests
Police initially believed the family's wealth lured the perpetrators into the house, but grew skeptical as numerous valuables had not been stolen. It also seemed unusual that Pan was left unharmed and had dialed 9-1-1 with her hands bound. The evening after the murder, police interviewed her.[20] Hann later woke up from a coma, and recalled to police that he saw Jennifer whispering to one of the hitmen in a friendly and soft manner. She was arrested on November 22, 2010,[21] during her third interview.[22][23] Jennifer admitted that she had hired the killers, but claimed the plan was to kill her, not her parents.[24] The interrogating officer, William "Bill" Goetz,[4][24] used the Reid technique to obtain Pan's confession.[25] He falsely told Pan that he had computer software that could analyse untruths in statements and that there were satellites with infrared technology to analyse movements in buildings;[24] in Canada, police are legally allowed to lie to those they are interrogating in regard to the evidence in the trial,[26] as well as in regard to the strategies they are using.[27]
The trial of Pan and her accomplices began in March 2014, in Newmarket; it lasted 10 months. All defendants pleaded not guilty to the charges of first degree murder, attempted murder, and conspiracy to commit murder. At the trial, York Regional Police evidence included exhaustive tracking of mobile device movements and text message traffic, including over 100 messages between Pan and Wong in the six hours prior to the killing.[31][32] Further evidence focused on the atypical nature of the "break-in", "robbery", shootings, and irregularities in Jennifer's testimony. Her obsession with Wong, emotionlessness confession regarding the attack, and recognition of the trauma she underwent were also detailed.[32] A major irregularity was that Jennifer was not assaulted, blindfolded, taken to the basement, nor shot, leaving behind an eyewitness to the attack. Hann's very different account also undermined her credibility. The trial included over 200 exhibits; over 50 witnesses testified.[4]
Jennifer, Wong, Mylvaganam, and Crawford were all convicted and sentenced to 25 years to life.[4][33][34][35]
Originally, Carty was tried with the other perpetrators. However, Edward Sapiano, his lawyer, fell ill,[12] and in mid-2014, Carty's case was declared a mistrial. In December 2015, Carty received an 18-year sentence after pleading guilty to conspiring to commit murder, with eligibility for parole after nine years, but died in prison in 2018. According to Carty, he did not wish to subject Hann Pan to another criminal trial.[1]
Penalties and imprisonment
Hann and Jennifer's brother requested a restraining order to ban her from any further contact; it was granted over Jennifer's lawyers' objections.[35] She is also banned from ever contacting Wong.[36]
In May 2023, the Court of Appeal for Ontario granted an appeal by Jennifer and her three co-conspirators on the first degree murder charge and ordered a new trial, on the grounds that the trial judge had incorrectly instructed the jury to only consider two scenarios that would justify a first-degree murder conviction, instead of allowing them to consider scenarios that would lead to second-degree murder and manslaughter convictions. The court also upheld the convictions for attempted murder of Hann.[40]
Aftermath
Bich Ha Pan's funeral was held in November 2010 at the Ogden Chapel in Scarborough. A funeral for Bich's father was held, according to Jennifer, prior to Bich's funeral to satisfy a Chinese custom that older members of the family have their funerals first. Jennifer had been asked to organize both funerals.[41] Bich Ha was buried on November 19.[42] Hann could not attend due to his injuries.[43]
Media coverage
According to the South China Morning Post, the case "sent shockwaves across Canada and the Asian diaspora."[3] An editorial in the Northwest Asian Weekly suggested consideration of the "idea of recognizing the mental and psychological symptoms that parenting may have gone too far" in the Pan household.[44] A story in Toronto Life magazine brought the case to widespread attention, framing it as an instance of tiger parenting gone tragically wrong.[4][5][44]
In April 2024, Netflix released What Jennifer Did a documentary about the case. Directed by Jenny Popplewell, it interviews police officers and people around Pan and contains footage from her police interviews.[45] Shortly after its release, several news outlets reported that Netflix had apparently used AI-generated images of Pan in the documentary without disclosing this information.[46][47][48] In an interview with the Toronto Star, executive producer Jeremy Grimaldi denied the allegation. He said distortions to the images were caused by the use of photo editing software to anonymize the photos to protect the identity of the source who supplied them.[49]
See also
Bart Whitaker – an American man who ordered a hit on his family after he faked continuing attending a university
Jean-Claude Romand – a French impostor who pretended to be a medical doctor for 18 years before killing his family when he was about to be exposed
Sef Gonzales – a similar case involving a Filipino-Australian young adult who killed his parents and made it look like a hate crime.
1 2 Grimaldi, ISBN1459735269, 9781459735262, PT 90Archived September 20, 2018, at the Wayback Machine . "Daniel Wong is arrested at work in front of his colleagues at Boston Pizza on April 26, 2011."
1 2 Dimanno, Rosie (September 15, 2014). "The astonishing testimony of Jennifer Pan". Toronto Star. Archived from the original on September 25, 2018. Retrieved September 25, 2018. Seven years until Wong – Pan says he was the one who put her in touch with "Homeboy," a man he knew through his marijuana dealing
1 2 3 4 Hasham, Alyshah (August 13, 2014). "Crown finishes presenting evidence against Jennifer Pan in murder trial". Toronto Star. Archived from the original on September 20, 2018. Retrieved September 20, 2018. [...]who in turn involved David Mylvaganam, allegedly one of three men who[...]It remains unclear who the other two men who entered the house are. The jury has heard that Crawford and Wong were both at work at the time of the murder.
↑ Grimaldi – Interview date: ISBN1459735250, 9781459735255 p. 66Archived September 20, 2018, at the Wayback Machine . "During her third police interview, on November 22, 2016, Jennifer opens up to Detective Goetz[...]" – Arrest: ISBN1459735250, 9781459735255 p. 74Archived September 20, 2018, at the Wayback Machine . Also ISBN1459735269, 9781459735262, Google BooksPT 273Archived September 20, 2018, at the Wayback Machine . "[...]Goetz returns before calmly stating, "[...]At this point of the investigation I will be arresting you for murder,[...]""
↑ Grimaldi, Jeremy (April 29, 2014). "Jennifer Pan betrays her own 'web of lies' in videotaped interview". DurhamRegion.com. Archived from the original on September 23, 2018. Retrieved September 23, 2018. Ms Pan's dramatic admission came after more than two hours of questioning in a small windowless room at York Police's markham station
↑ Grimaldi, ISBN1459735269, 9781459735262, Google BooksPT50Archived September 3, 2020, at the Wayback Machine . "In 2000, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that police are allowed to lie not only about evidence but tactics, as well."
↑ Grimaldi, ISBN1459735269, 9781459735262, PT89Archived September 3, 2020, at the Wayback Machine . "Two days after speaking with Denise Brown, Detective Courtice gives the order to take David down.[...]The following day, police descend on Maplehurst Correctional[...]where Eric Carty is held, and charge him with the same." PT88Archived September 3, 2020, at the Wayback Machine states: "[...]on April 12, when police finally get in touch with Denise Brown,[...]"
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