A Tsawwassen family is breathing a sigh of relief after the man convicted of murdering six members of their family decided to waive his right to a parole hearing.
Shelley Boden and several members of her family were planning on traveling to Bowden, Alberta, which is just south of Red Deer, in September for another parole hearing for David Ennis. However, Boden received word Thursday he had elected to forgo the hearing this time around.
That means he will not be eligible for parole again until August 2016.
Boden said the family was relieved and happy with the development.
"We can now enjoy our summer," she said after receiving a phone call from the parole board. "It's a great day."
Ennis, who was known as David Shearing at the time of the murders, has been behind bars since the early 1980s, after admitting to killing six members of one family on a camping trip in Wells Gray Park in B.C.'s Interior in 1982.
He pleaded guilty almost two years after the slaying and was sentenced to life in prison.
Ennis stalked the family before shooting Boden's aunt and uncle, Bob and Jackie Johnson, and Jackie Johnson's parents, George and Edith Bentley. He kept the Johnson's two daughters, Janet, 13, and Karen, 11, alive for several days and sexually assaulted the two girls before killing them as well.
He then put all six bodies in the family's car and set it on fire on a remote logging road.
He was first denied parole in 2008, and then again in 2012.
Boden and her family have made the trek to Alberta each time in an effort to ensure that Shearing is never released.
"The more that we go shows we care that he doesn't get out," Boden said, adding many members of the family read victim impact statements at the hearings and it forces the family to relive the nightmare of the murders.
