No jail for mom who abducted daughter in 1993

A woman who pleaded guilty to kidnapping her infant daughter and keeping it a secret for nearly 20 years was sentenced to two years of probation on Tuesday.

Patricia O’Byrne, 55, will not serve any jail time but will be under house arrest for four months, Justice Mara Greene said during her sentencing.

O’Byrne pleaded guilty to the daughter’s abduction on Feb. 15.

The girl’s father Joe Chisholm said in his victim impact statement said his daughter’s 1993 disappearance “choked” the joy out of his life.

However, he asked for leniency for O’Byrne, saying he didn’t want their daughter to feel responsible for her mother’s suffering if she were sent to jail.

Greene said Tuesday that Chisholm was a “truly wonderful person” and his daughter would have benefitted from knowing him.

“He suffered years of guilt, anxiety and depression” without his daughter, Greene said.

But O’Bryne, Greene said, “truly believed” the only way to protect her child was to disappear. O’Byrne, who was sexually abused as a child, wrongly thought that her daughter was at risk in Chisholm’s care, Greene said.

“Her daughter was well cared for and she was a wonderful mother…However she also didn’t allow the family to be reunited after the concern for her daughter’s safety was long past,” Greene said.

O’Byrne said she took the infant, then 20 months old, from Toronto in 1993 while in the midst of a custody battle with Chisholm.

The pair then moved to British Columbia, where they lived for 18 years. O’Byrne and her daughter were known as Pamela and Thea Whalen.

O’Byrne was arrested in Victoria in December 2011.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today