Anthony Hanemaayer

A negligent investigation led to the wrongful incarceration and a permanent taint of Anthony Hanemaayer who describes the occurrence as one that “will stay with me forever, for as long as I live.  I can never leave that past”  

Anthony Hanemaayer’s life was forever altered after a break and enter into a 15-year-old girls' room that occurred on September 29th 1987, in Ontario.  Anthony soon became a suspect after the victim's mother, who had intervened the night of the attack and caught a second's long glimpse of the attacker, and conducted her own investigation.  Her focus landed on a construction company that was working in the area at the time of the attack, and based on the description she gave of the perpetrator they believed it matched Anthony Hanemaayer.  Following these events, her eye witness testimony became the key aspect of convicting, at the time 19-year-old, Anthony, unfortunately disregarding the fact that he had quit his job at the construction company 5 days prior to the incident, not owning a white car and not having driven it to the site while being employed at the company.  He was arrested two months after the night of the attack and convicted on October 18th 1989 for break and enter and assault with intent to rape, two years less one day, a deal in which his lawyer advised him to take.   

Hanemaayer spent 18 months in jail, however his journey took 21 years.  The ending came when the Ontario Court of Appeal acquitted him on June 25, 2008, following a 2006 confession from Paul Bernardo for the crime.  The unfortunate truth is, as told by Hanemaayer himself, is that “being acquitted never really changed anything for me. Even to this day, people still believe that I am the one.  I believe I am in Paul Bernardo’s shadow.”