Richardson family murders

Discovery of the Crime

The bodies of Marc and Debra Richardson were discovered in the basement of their Medicine Hat home at approximately 1:00 p.m. on April 23, 2006, and the body of their eight-year-old son, Jacob, was found upstairs. The discovery was made by a young friend of Jacob's who had arrived for a playdate and found the scene, alerting his mother who then notified the police. Autopsies revealed Marc Richardson had suffered 24 stab wounds, Debra had 12 stab wounds, and Jacob had a slit throat along with stab wounds to his head and torso. The couple's 12-year-old daughter, Jasmine, was notably absent from the home, initially raising fears she was another victim, but her disappearance quickly shifted the focus of the investigation. A key piece of evidence was found in Jasmine's school locker: a stick figure drawing depicting her family being murdered. This discovery helped direct police to locate Jasmine and Jeremy Steinke the following day in Leader, Saskatchewan, about 130 kilometres away from Medicine Hat. On May 3, 2006, a third individual, 19-year-old Kacy Lancaster, was charged with being an accessory for driving the couple away later in the day and for disposing of evidence.

Background of the Perpetrators

Jasmine Richardson was born on October 21, 1993, in Ontario, Canada. She was a 12-year-old straight-A student at a Catholic school in Medicine Hat, Alberta, when she committed the murders. Richardson had become immersed in the goth subculture online and falsified her age on social media profiles. She began a relationship with 23-year-old Jeremy Steinke in early 2006, which her parents forbade due to his age.

Jasmine Richardson was born on October 21, 1993, in Ontario to Marc and Debra Richardson, who were recovering drug addicts who had met three years previously at a gymnasium in Sudbury and married the following year. The family, which included her younger brother Jacob born five years later, moved to Okotoks, Alberta, and later to Medicine Hat in 2005 after Marc received a promotion at his job. Jasmine was described as a bright, studious straight-A student who made the honour roll at her Catholic school and was actively involved in the fine arts program. Her behaviour changed significantly in the summer of 2005 after she became involved with a local goth subculture at the Medicine Hat Mall, where she and her friends began modeling themselves after an older group. She began falsifying her age on social media sites like MySpace and Zorpia, posting inappropriate photos, claiming to be bisexual and Wiccan and to drink alcohol, and listing interests in serial killers, scarification, and 'kinky shit.' On her profiles, she listed serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer and musician Marilyn Manson among others as her heroes. Her relationship with her parents deteriorated as she broke rules, violated school dress codes in favour of gothic attire, sneaked out to meet Steinke, and spoke of running away from home and wanting into foster care. She had also developed animosity towards her brother, with Steinke claiming he witnessed her strangling Jacob on one occasion, and Jacob reportedly confiding in a family friend that he was afraid of his older sister.

Jeremy Allan Steinke was born on January 15, 1983, in Medicine Hat, Alberta. He had a troubled childhood marked by abuse and was diagnosed with ADHD. Steinke dropped out of high school, abused drugs and alcohol, and immersed himself in the goth subculture. He created a VampireFreaks page expressing violent fantasies and was unemployed, living in a trailer with his mother, at the time of the murders.

Jeremy Allan Steinke was born on January 15, 1983, in Medicine Hat to Jacqueline Ann May and endured a lifetime of physical abuse throughout his childhood at the hands of both his biological father and two of his stepfathers. He attended elementary school in the South Ridge neighbourhood from first to third grade and Crestwood from fourth to sixth grade, where he was mercilessly bullied and teased about his last name, being called 'Stinky.' Diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and placed in a program for developmentally disabled youth, he began drinking at age 14 and using drugs like shrooms, ecstasy, acid, and marijuana, also starting to cut himself. He dropped out of high school, briefly lived with his biological father in Saskatchewan but moved out after a disagreement with his stepmother, and attempted to redeem himself by enrolling at Medicine Hat College and working jobs including at Tim Hortons and a prospective oilman trade apprenticeship, but these avenues failed. Steinke immersed himself in the goth scene, listening to heavy metal and aspiring to be a musician, while recruiting much younger adults and teenagers to become his group of gothic friends and supplying them drugs and alcohol. His VampireFreaks.com profile, created in 2005, contained violent and racist statements, including liking to kill prostitutes and then playing with their insides and eating them, and expressing his dislikes as 'niggers' and 'pigs.' He was introduced to Jasmine Richardson in January 2006 by a mutual friend and schoolmate named Kaylee and began a relationship with her a month later, though he maintained he was unaware of her true age despite friends expressing disgust at the age gap.

Events of the Murders and Aftermath

The noise awoke Debra Richardson, who went to investigate and was immediately attacked by Steinke as he lunged at her and pelted her with slashings and stab wounds while she held up her hands and arms to shield herself. Hearing her screams, Marc Richardson charged into the basement and went at Steinke with a screwdriver, jabbing Steinke in the eye before being overpowered and stabbed repeatedly, with his last words reportedly asking Steinke why he was doing this, to which Steinke replied, 'Because it's what your daughter wanted.' Eight-year-old Jacob Richardson, who was upstairs and frightened having heard the entire altercation, was also killed with multiple stab wounds and a slit throat. Investigators found evidence that he had fought valiantly against his attacker, and it was alleged he had utilized his toy lightsaber to defend himself. The perpetrator of Jacob's fatal wounds was disputed, with Steinke claiming it was Jasmine and Jasmine insisting it was Steinke, and they apparently rationalized the murder with the notion that Jacob was too emotionally sensitive to be orphaned. After the attacks, Steinke sped away frantically in his truck, leaving Jasmine with the bloody crime scene where she rinsed off the knife used to kill her brother, filled a canvas bag with clothes and toiletries, took her mother's purse, and used her mother's credit card to withdraw cash from an ATM at 7-Eleven to dispatch a taxicab to Steinke's trailer, where they had sex. Later in the morning, they went to a house party hosted by a friend of Steinke's near the crime scene, where witnesses observed Jasmine laughing and talking joyously, sitting in Steinke's lap and passionately making out with him, and Steinke showing off his eye injury to partygoers while blurting out that he had killed his girlfriend's family, stating he 'gutted them like fish,' with Jasmine corroborating and adding, 'My little brother gargled.' After the party, they fled to Leader, Saskatchewan, with Kacy Lancaster, Kaylee, and another teenage girl, where they were located at a convenience store and arrested on April 24.

Motive and Influencing Factors

The primary motive for the murders stemmed from Jasmine Richardson's desire to escape her parents' strict rules, particularly their grounding her for dating Jeremy Steinke because of the age disparity, which was also criticized by her friends. She had expressed fantasies about being rid of her parents once and for all, citing an incident where she was caught making out with Steinke in a back alley after sneaking away from her parents at a punk rock concert as her breaking point. Steinke, who told friends he was a 300-year-old werewolf, liked the taste of blood, and wore a small vial of blood around his neck, was deeply influenced by violent media. Hours before the murders, he and some friends reportedly watched the film Natural Born Killers (1994), which tells the story of two victims of traumatic childhoods who become lovers and spree killers, and he told his friends that he and his girlfriend should go about their plans in a similar manner, but without sparing her little brother, later telling an undercover officer, 'You ever watch the movie Natural Born Killers?... I think that's the best love story of all time...' The couple's communication, which included public messages on the social networking sites Nexopia and VampireFreaks, revealed their troubled mindset, with various messages they sent to each other available to the public before the accounts were permanently removed by site staff. Jasmine's online profile, under the name 'runawaydevil', falsely said she was 15 years of age and ended with the text 'Welcome to my tragic end.'

Legal Proceedings and Outcomes

Jasmine Richardson was convicted on three counts of first-degree murder on July 9, 2007. She is the youngest person in Canada ever convicted of multiple first-degree murder counts. On November 8, 2007, she received the maximum youth sentence of 10 years' imprisonment. Her sentence was completed on May 6, 2016, and her criminal record was expunged in 2020.

Under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, Richardson's name could no longer be published in Canada after she became a suspect, and as she was twelve at the time of the crime, she could not be sentenced as an adult or given more than a ten-year sentence. She was found guilty on July 9, 2007, on three counts of first-degree murder, making her the youngest person in Canada ever convicted of a multiple murder. On November 8, 2007, she was sentenced to the maximum allowed under law for someone her age, 10 years imprisonment, which included credit for eighteen months already spent in custody, to be followed by four years in a psychiatric institution and four-and-a-half years under conditional supervision in the community. In September 2011, she began attending classes at Mount Royal University in Calgary during the final years of her sentence, was released from a five-year sentence at a psychiatric hospital in the fall of 2011, and in October 2012, it was reported her rehabilitation was going well and she expressed remorse for her actions that experts considered genuine. Her sentence was completed on May 6, 2016, freeing her from any further court-ordered conditions, restrictions, or supervision after a final sentence review, and her criminal record was set to be expunged in April 2021 but was formally expunged a year early in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic provided she engaged in no further criminal activity. Jeremy Steinke was convicted on three counts of first-degree murder. He admitted to the murders of Marc and Debra Richardson in conversation with an undercover police officer. Steinke asserted that Jasmine Richardson murdered her brother Jacob.

Jeremy Steinke admitted to the murder of the parents in conversation with an undercover police officer while in custody and also asserted that Jasmine was the one to murder her little brother Jacob. While both were in jail, he and Richardson exchanged letters in which they professed love to one another and vowed to visit one another no matter what, with Steinke proposing marriage to Richardson in one of these letters, which she accepted. He was tried in November 2008 and found guilty by a jury on three counts of first-degree murder for the killings of the three Richardson victims. On December 15, 2008, Steinke was sentenced to three life sentences, one for each first-degree murder count, to be served concurrently, and he will be eligible for parole after serving twenty-five years. While in prison, Steinke legally changed his name to Jackson May, to honour his mother Jacqueline May, who died on March 29, 2016.

Kacy Lancaster was a 19-year-old friend of Jeremy Steinke. She was charged with being an accessory after the fact for driving Steinke and Richardson away and for disposing of evidence. The accessory to murder charge against her was dropped. She pleaded guilty to an obstruction charge and received one year of house arrest as part of a plea bargain.

The accessory to murder charge against Kacy Lancaster was dropped. She pleaded guilty to an obstruction charge in Medicine Hat provincial court. As part of the plea bargain, she received one year of house arrest. She was also ordered to refrain from drugs and alcohol.

Media Depictions and Cultural References

The Richardson family murders have been featured on several true crime television programs. Due to publication bans under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, depictions often use pseudonyms for Jasmine Richardson. The case was featured on the Investigation Discovery show Deadly Women, where she was referred to as 'J.R.' It was also featured on the Canadian series Killer Kids, using the pseudonym 'Amanda Patterson.' The 2022 novel The Patient's Secret by Loreth Anne White is loosely based on the murders. The case is cited in discussions about youth violence, the goth subculture, online communities, and the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

Comparative Cases and Lasting Impact

The Richardson family murders share characteristics with other parricide cases where a daughter and her boyfriend conspired to kill her family, often motivated by parental disapproval of the relationship. Notable comparative cases include the Murder of Bich Pan in Canada, the Barbecue murders in the United States, the Richthofen family murders in Brazil, and the Johnson family murders in the United States, which was also motivated by the parents' forbidding their daughter to date her older boyfriend. These cases similarly explore themes of forbidden relationships, adolescent rebellion, and extreme family conflict. The Richardson case had a lasting impact on Canadian legal and social discourse, highlighting the extreme application of the Youth Criminal Justice Act and raising questions about adolescent development, the influence of violent subcultures and media, and the role of social media in the lives of troubled youth. The completion of Jasmine Richardson's sentence and the expungement of her record in 2020 marked a formal end to the legal saga, though the tragedy remains a sombre reference point in Canadian true crime history and a case study in the potential for extreme youth violence.

Questions about Richardson family murders

What was Jasmine Richardson's sentence?

Jasmine Richardson was convicted of three counts of first-degree murder in July 2007. As she was 13 at the time of conviction, she was sentenced under the Youth Criminal Justice Act. On November 8, 2007, she received the maximum youth sentence of 10 years' imprisonment, which included time in custody, a psychiatric institution, and community supervision. Her sentence was completed on May 6, 2016.

What were the Richardson family murders?

The Richardson family murders were the planned killings of three family members in Medicine Hat, Alberta, in April 2006. Twelve year old Jasmine Richardson and her 23 year old boyfriend Jeremy Steinke were each convicted of three counts of first degree murder for the deaths of Jasmine's parents, Marc and Debra Richardson, and her eight year old brother, Jacob. The bodies were discovered on April 23, 2006, after a young friend arrived for a playdate. Marc had 24 stab wounds, Debra had 12 stab wounds, and Jacob had a slit throat and stab wounds to his head and torso. Jasmine Richardson, who was 13 at the time of her conviction, is the youngest person in Canada ever convicted of multiple first degree murder counts.

What happened to Jeremy Steinke?

Jeremy Steinke was found guilty by a jury on three counts of first degree murder in November 2008. On December 15, 2008, he was sentenced to three concurrent life sentences, with eligibility for parole after serving twenty five years. While in prison, he legally changed his name to Jackson May to honour his mother, Jacqueline May, who died in 2016. During his trial, Steinke admitted to the murders of the parents in conversation with an undercover police officer, though he asserted that Jasmine Richardson murdered her brother Jacob.

How were Jasmine Richardson and Jeremy Steinke caught?

Jasmine Richardson and Jeremy Steinke were arrested the day after the murders, on April 24, 2006, in Leader, Saskatchewan, about 130 kilometres from Medicine Hat. Their arrest followed the discovery of a stick figure drawing depicting her family being murdered inside Jasmine's locker at school. They had fled to Saskatchewan with friends, including Kacy Lancaster who drove them. They were located at a convenience store and taken into custody. Lancaster was later charged with being an accessory for driving them and disposing of evidence.

What was the motive for the murders?

The primary motive was Jasmine Richardson's desire to be free from her parents' control, particularly their forbidding of her relationship with the much older Jeremy Steinke. Influences included their immersion in the goth subculture and disturbing online interests. Hours before the murders, Steinke and friends watched the film Natural Born Killers, and Steinke suggested he and Jasmine should emulate the spree killers in the movie. According to Steinke, Marc Richardson's last words were a question asking why this was happening, to which Steinke replied, 'Because it's what your daughter wanted.'

Is Jasmine Richardson's criminal record still active?

No, Jasmine Richardson's criminal record is not active. As part of her youth sentence under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, her record was set to be automatically expunged in April 2021, the fifteenth anniversary of the murders, provided she engaged in no further criminal activity. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was formally expunged one year early, in 2020. She completed her maximum 10 year sentence on May 6, 2016, which included time in custody, a psychiatric institution, and conditional supervision in the community.

Sources and further reading

• Richardson family murders (Wikipedia)
• The Richardson Family Murders (canadiantruecrime.ca)
• J.R., who stabbed family to death with boyfriend at age 12 ... (cbc.ca)

Checked by the Your Space Hamilton desk. Last updated 2026-10-21.