Convicted murderer and former Toronto police officer Richard Wills has been transferred out of an Ontario prison because his behaviour disgusted Kingston Penitentiary staff and inmates, including schoolgirl sex killer Paul Bernardo, the Star has learned.

Exactly what the 25-year police veteran did behind bars remains a mystery, but it was enough to disturb and depress his maximum-security prison neighbours, including Bernardo, two justice system sources said.

Will and Bernardo were neighbours in the same segregated range of the penitentiary, along with Russell Williams, former commander of CFB Trenton, who was sentenced in 2010 to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years for two sadistic sex murders.

Wills was transferred to a maximum-security facility in B.C. late last month for a fresh start, the sources said. Suzanne Leclerc, of Corrections Canada in Ottawa, said she is prevented by the Privacy Act from saying where federal inmates are housed.

Solitary confinement prisoners can talk but not see inmates in adjoining cells. Cells in Kingston Pentitentiary, which opened in 1835, are 2.5 by 3 metres.

During his pre-trial and trial in Newmarket, Wills repeatedly disgusted courtroom observers before he was convicted in 2007 of first-degree murder for bludgeoning and strangling his mistress, Lavinia (Linda) Mariani.

Her body was found face-down in a garbage can and hidden behind a basement wall of his Hart St. home in Richmond Hill in 2002.

He frequently interrupted courtroom proceedings by loudly passing gas and belching and once brought things to a temporary halt by reaching into his pants and pulling out feces.

The longtime traffic cop also made a practice of urinating in the police car used to drive him to court every day from the Lindsay jail.

When he was particularly disruptive, Justice Michelle Fuerst would confine him to what court observers called “the rubber room,” a special area where he could see court proceedings on a special screen but not disrupt them.

During his trial, Wills repeatedly lashed out at Fuerst with sexist comments and ridiculed one of his lawyers with a racist epithet.

He fired five lawyers during his publicly funded case, which dragged through the system for more than five years. He also threatened from the prisoner’s box to punch out prosecutors Harold Dale and Jeff Pearson.

While behind bars during his trial, Wills had a rough relationship with other inmates in an ultra-high security wing. Biker Frank (Cisco) Lenti would repeatedly heckle him to the delight of other inmates, a former prisoner told the Star.

Wills testified that Mariani, 40, died in an accidental fall in his Richmond Hill home.

Dale and Pearson theorized that Wills smashed her on the head with a baseball bat and choked her with rope because he was upset she wouldn’t leave her husband.

Segregation prisoners at Kingston Penitentiary are allowed outside their cells for an hour a day. The rest of the time, they can read, write and watch television, if they can afford a set, but they’re not allowed access to computers or the Internet.

Wills is eligible for day parole on June 7, 2024, and for full parole on June 7, 2027.

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