Andrea Giesbrecht, 43, has been jailed for 8½ years for concealing the remains of six infants in a storage locker in Winnipeg. With time already served factored in, Giesbrecht will spend another seven years and 10 months in prison. How the babies died is left unknown but their concealment was laid directly at the Winnipeg woman’s feet with all the implications of the verdict. “Giesbrecht’s moral culpability is extremely high,” Judge Murray Thompson said at Friday’s sentencing hearing. She showed little emotion in court as the judge read his decision. Court heard she hid the bodies of six infants in a U-Haul storage locker she rented. The remains were found Oct. 20, 2014 by employees at the facility, after the woman failed to pay her bill. They were bagged and sealed or encased in cement or powder in an effort to contain the smell of human decomposition and decay.
GAMBLING ADDICTION
Judge Thompson noted that Section 243 of the Criminal Code which forbids such disposal of remains to ensure that newborn deaths are investigated. The judge dismissed the possibility of a non-custodial sentence, noting “Giesbrecht has a well-documented history of deceiving others.” He noted Giesbrecht’s history of gambling addiction, two convictions of fraud over $5,000, and the deceit confirmed by the convictions for concealing the remains. “This required a significant degree of deliberation. Concealing the pregnancies, renting a storage locker, placing each of the bodies there. She has not demonstrated any remorse,” Thompson said. Giesbrecht archive