 Victoria Stafford's mother, Tara McDonald. (Sun Media/Elliot Ferguson, file)
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WOODSTOCK -- Tara McDonald yesterday lashed out at police and the suspects in the killing of her daughter, while denying reports her addiction to painkillers brought the two into her life.
"My daughter's not coming home. I want the killers dead," little Victoria (Tori) Stafford's mom said in an interview with The London Free Press.
McDonald also had harsh words for police, who she said targeted her and her boyfriend for 42 days, even while having an accused abductor in custody almost the entire time.
"The three times I was interviewed by police, they said, we know it's you," McDonald said.
Breaking a two-day silence since the charges of abduction and murder of her eight-year-old daughter, McDonald said she could barely bring herself to think about the final hours of her "beautiful little princess."
"To think someone took my daughter and then . . . I can't even think about it," she said.
"I know there are sick and twisted people in the world but I had no idea. I don't want to sound selfish and I wish this on no one, but I sometimes think, why did it have to be my daughter?"
Often accused of being emotionless during her ordeal, McDonald fought back tears in an hour-long interview and several times failed to stop the flow. "Every day I've been bawling my eyes out and I think, I'm going to wake up and it's going to be back to normal "
She's refused to make funeral arrangements until she sees Tori's body.
McDonald said she won't accept the death until she sees her.
"That is the only thing that keeps me from going off my rocker."
When police met her Tuesday night to tell her of the arrests, she thought they had good news about Tori.
"All I kept thinking, all along, was that she's somewhere; she's fine; someone is taking care of her. They just wanted a beautiful little girl for themselves and they took my beautiful girl."
McDonald spent yesterday and the day before hiding from the media horde that's descended on Woodstock since the news of the arrests, avoiding her home where cameras were set up all day.
"I am just not ready yet."
But she promised to make a public statement soon, perhaps today, to thank the thousands of people who helped to spread the word about Tori and searched for her.
"So many people helped me. They tried so hard to find Tori."
She also vowed to hold police accountable for how they treated her, her son, Daryn, 11, her boyfriend James Goris and friends.
"One officer came into my house and said, 'You are my prime suspect.' He said, 'I have been doing this job as long as you have been alive and I have never seen a mother behave like you.' I said, 'You should have dropped off the mother's handbook to me so I would know how I'm supposed to behave.' "
Even worse was the way police treated Daryn, she said.
Daryn was questioned without a family member present and subject to horrible suggestions, McDonald said.
"He cried all night when he came home."
McDonald said police suggested to Daryn he knew where Tori was, that Goris was a pedophile and asked Daryn if he'd seen Goris hurt Tori.
"I don't know what I'm going to do about it, but I'm going to do something about it," McDonald vowed. "I don't want anyone else to have to go through this."
Police told her son he'd better go to school or end up "a mess like his mother," she said.
"Police wouldn't believe a thing we said," Goris said. "None of them have even been man enough to apologize to us."
Told of McDonald's complaints about police behaviour, OPP Det. Insp. Bill Renton -- heading the investigation -- last night said he could not comment.
Tori went missing April 8 after dismissal from Oliver Stephens public school. A surveillance camera from a nearby high school caught a woman wearing a white puffy coat and with dark, long hair pulled back walking with the little girl.
On Tuesday, police arrested Terri-Lynne McClintic, 18, of Woodstock, on charges of abduction and accessory to murder after the fact.
McClintic was taken into custody April 12 on unrelated matters, sources said. Police confirmed yesterday one of the accused was in custody before the charges were laid.
Michael Thomas C.S. Rafferty, 28, is charged with abduction and first-degree murder.
Police have not found Tori's body, and continued to search the Guelph area yesterday, with McClintic's help.
Since the arrests, there've been media reports McDonald and Goris bought Oxycontin painkillers from McClintic's mother, Carol, who lived with her daughter.
There've also been reports McDonald wanted to give furniture to the family.
McDonald confirmed she wanted to donate a couch to Carol the moment she entered the dingy apartment whose sole livingroom furniture, she said, seemed to be a futon.
She adamantly denied buying drugs from Carol or Terri-Lynne.
Soon after meeting Carol, she decided the woman wasn't a responsible enough pet owner to trust for breeding, McDonald said.
They met at most three times, McDonald said.
Terri-Lynn was in the apartment once, but was so high on drugs she barely noticed their presence, McDonald said.
She never spoke to Terri-Lynne, or mentioned her children, McDonald said.
After Tori went missing, police asked the couple for a list of potential suspects --perhaps people who were new in their lives or people who didn't like them.
"It was our ex-partners first, then McClintic. They asked if there was anyone new in our lives and she was," Goris said.
After the video came out, both noticed the similarity of the woman in the video to McClintic.
Goris said he saw McClintic a few days after the abduction, just before she was arrested on outstanding warrants, and noticed her hair had been cut. He also learned there was a white puffy jacket in the apartment that had been dyed pink.
Goris said he told police about his suspicions, but they continued to focus their attention on himself and McDonald.
"It's a huge screwup by police officers. They had her in custody four days after. Maybe they could have saved Tori."
The couple struggled to figure out how Tori could walk away with someone she had never met.
"It could have been something as simple as someone mentioning she had a dog like the little girl," Goris suggested.
