NEW WESTMINSTER, B.C. - The Robert Pickton murder trial is expected to wrap up well before Christmas, the jury was told Tuesday.
When the trial started in January, the jury heard it would last a year or longer.
"This trial isn't going to last a year,'' Justice James Williams told the seven men and five women.
"It brings to mind the Bing Crosby song. You'll be home for Christmas. You'll be home well before Christmas.''
He said that while the stop-and-go pace of the trial can be irritating, it is moving quite efficiently and will be over "significantly in advance of the end of the year.''
Williams said the Crown is expected to wrap up its case in the next few weeks.
The trial sat briefly Tuesday as the Crown brought RCMP Cpl. Jennifer Hyland to the stand.
She testified about the night of March 20, 1999, when she pulled Pickton over on suspicion of impaired driving. Hyland was working as a constable for the New Westminster police.
She told the jury how she started her shift at 7 p.m. and went to 12th Street, a strip where sex trade workers are known to stroll.
There she saw a small pickup truck in front of her driving at a significantly slow speed on the busy street.
Hyland testified that the vehicle veered from the yellow lane to the sidewalk. She called it a "dramatic manoeuvre'' because of the width of the street.
She followed the car into neighbouring suburb Burnaby and back to New Westminister. At this point she pulled over the pickup truck and called a senior officer for backup to administer an impaired driving test since Hyland wasn't trained to give such a test.
Hyland told the jury the driver of the vehicle was Pickton and that he had a female passenger who she identified as Lynn Ellingsen, who has testified she saw Pickton with a woman hanging from a hook in his slaughterhouse.
"He looks a little bit different,'' she told the courtroom, referring to Pickton. "His hair was shorter at the time and he's lost some weight.''
A sobriety test was taken and it was determined Pickton wasn't impaired in any way.
Pickton is being tried on six counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of women from Vancouver's seedy Downtown Eastside.
He faces trial on another 20 counts later.
