Don't put the lunatic in charge: The Verdun hold-up that rocked a town

Hawley, Thompson and Moran

   When setting up a robbery, a gang is tempted to give the most difficult task to the most fearless and brazen member.
   But that person is also be the likeliest to be the least predictable and most insane.
   This issue led to one of the saddest events in Verdun in the early 1960s when a trio of bandits entrusted a member with serious mental problems to carry out a robbery.
   Tears, death and ample prison time ensued.
   On Saturday Oct. 26, 1963, Yvon Tousignant, 49, who co-owned the Tousignant Brothers Market at 4835 Wellington was shot dead in a robbery which saw $2,027 stolen from his deposit bag at Wellington and Fourth.
   Soon after, Toronto police rounded up wheelman Robert Hawley, 23, gun supplier Robert Moran, 29, and Robert James Thompson, 25, who fired the fatal shot with a .38 handgun.
   Hawley confessed to Toronto detectives John Bassett and Kenneth Evans and the gang was rounded up and charged.

Myrtle "Terry" Feehan and Rose Anne Johnson

     “I wasn't there. I was around the corner waiting in a car with the motor running," said Hawley. "Thompson was the one to get the money. He ran to the car and jumped in. We went to our apartment on St. Denis St. My wife was there. We listened to the radio and heard that the guy was shot. We divided the money and left for Toronto. We got arrested tonight and here I am.”
   The two Toronto detectives that recorded the confession would die soon after, as they were among the 118 killed in a downed TCA flight from Ste. Therese on November 29. They had the confession in their possession and it was one of the few items that survived the crash and so it was admitted as evidence.
   Hawley said that the confession was coerced but the court had already heard the confession. It was read again in court and Hawley was sentenced to life imprisonment.
   Thompson - who said that he had shot Tousignant twice after the grocer had grabbed him by the arm - was deemed unfit to stand trial and was kept behind bars.
 Moran, who played a minor role, was tried at a later date.
   Hawley and Thompson had met at the Verdun Protestant Hospital where both had been admitted for suicidal tendencies.
   Hawley had slit his wrists in order to get a break from the prison and had escaped the hospital 13 days before the killing.
   When asked about how he was making a living while on the lam, he said “I sold pills, seconal tablets. I bought them in a tavern on St. Lawence and sold them to anybody who wanted to buy them.”
   Hawley confessed to owning a .32 calibre gun that he had purchased outside a tavern on the Main.
   Hawley denied fleeing to Toronto in order to escape capture following the murder. He said he paid Donald Smith $200 to drive him there just because he wanted to visit.
   His girlfriend Myrtle Feehan, 20, also known as Teery Feehan, contradicted much of his testimony.
    Feeham,20, and Rose Anne Johnson were charged with the crime of being accessories after the fact. They were released from prison on strict conditions after serving about one year.
  Terry Feeham, as she was known, had disposed of the gun. Johnson hadn't done much of anything except accompany her Toronto boyfriend to Montreal to organize the pick-up.
   Feehan went on to live a normal life, marrying a man named Fiddler. She had two children in the early 70s and died in 2006.
   Moran, according to a relative, obtained a degree in Criminology while in prison. He was a free man by the 90s but died shortly after his release while living in the Maritimes.
   Irving "Slim" Tovell drove the robbers to Toronto but he also died in the same air crash that killed the detectives.
   One person who might have a description of the crime was Valerie Edwards, 18, who saw the event happen.  She was a stenographer who lived across the street. She was 18 at the time and would be 70 today.