B.C. Court of Appeal upholds murder conviction for Vancouver Island prison escapee

By Canadian Press on April 11, 2025.

VANCOUVER — The British Columbia Court of Appeal has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of James Busch, who escaped from a Vancouver Island prison in 2019 with another inmate, then killed a man who lived near the institution.

Busch and fellow inmate Zachary Armitage escaped from William Head Institution, a minimum security prison, on July 7, 2019, and 60-year-old Martin Payne was murdered in his home the next day.

The Appeal Court ruling says Payne was found dead on his bathroom floor days later “in a pool of blood, with duct tape on his leg and arm.”

It says Armitage eventually pleaded guilty to the killing, but Busch continued on with a trial that focused on whether he was involved in the murder to some degree, “if at all.”

A jury found him guilty of first-degree murder in 2022, but he appealed the conviction claiming the lower court judge gave improper instructions about his “potential liability for aiding a planned and deliberate first-degree murder.”

The three-judge panel dismissed the appeal Friday, finding the judge gave “well-structured and organized” jury instructions that boiled down complex legal concepts to be “easily understood,” rejecting Busch’s appeal that focused on “one narrow area” of jury instructions.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 11, 2025.

The Canadian Press