Accused killer insists his dead family had no enemies

A judge will continue watching interviews videotaped by police with accused killer Jason Klaus as a triple first-degree murder trial continues Tuesday in Red Deer.

Klaus and his friend, Joshua Frank, are accused of killing Gordon, Sandra and Monica Klaus on Dec. 8, 2013, then setting the family farmhouse on fire.

Two days after he lost his parents and sister, Jason Klaus was interviewed at length by RCMP Major Crimes Sgt. Rob Kropp.

"I get mad that they're gone," Klaus said as he began to cry. "I don't know why. I don't understand it."

He insisted his family had absolutely no enemies andthat they were well-regarded in the Castor, Alta.,region.

"Foul play can be ruled out because nobody would do nothing to them," he told Kropp.

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The sergeant pushed him a little.

"But if someone deliberately set this fire, who do you think would have done it?" Kropp asked.

"I couldn't pull a name out of anywhere," Klaus replied. "I don't think anybody could. Honest to God, they did not do one person wrong that would be that severe they'd want to come back and hurt them."

During the three-hour interview, Klaus continued to insist his parents and sister were his best friends.

"They were incredible people," he said. "That's why I'm so upset about losing them the best people in the world. It makes me angry. I don't ever want to hear someone talk bad about them. They weren't bad people."

Rigid life on the farm

Klaus repeatedly indicated his father Gordon demanded a lot from the family.

"Dad was a tough father," Klaus said. "He was stern and hard. I respect that. Made me who I am today."

Klaus told the Mountie he worked sevendays a week on the farm, from 'sun-up to sundown.'His regular routine was to leave by 7:30 a.m. to drive the two or three minutes from his trailer on the same property down to the farmhouse, trying never to be late.

"That's protocol. Dad's very adamant about that," he said.

Klaus said he was taught that farm work always took priority over everything else.

"Farm time had to be done first," Klaus said. "Then playtime later. That's the way I was brought up. I wouldn't want it any other way."

Even the family dog had to abide by strict rules. The spirited four-year-old chocolate lab was not allowed into the house past the porch. Only when it was minus 40 C or below would the pet be allowed to sleep inside on the porch instead of the plastic straw-filled doghouse outside.

Joshua Frank faces an additional charge of injuring or endangering an animal for allegedly shooting and killing the family's dog. The pet's body was found outside the burning house.

Health problems

A year and a half before he died, Gordon Klaus, 61, was diagnosed with blocked arteries.

He had a total of six stents inserted, including during one operation just a week before his death.

Jason Klaus quit his job so he could work on the farm full time.

He was doing more and more of the work while his father's physical condition noticeably deteriorated, he said.

"He was frustrated," Klaus said of his father. "He lost all his ability to do work all around the clock. He was a man of steel. He lost energy, ambition. It was hard to see."

"A hard-working man being turned into an old man overnight."

Farm was in Gordon Klaus's name

Jason Klaus told the RCMP investigator that he and his father were partners on the farm. Then he quickly clarified he had no ownership of the farm, that it was all in his father's name.

"I was just there to be their son and their helper. That's all I've been all these years," he said.

"He owned everything and I was more or less 'the help.' "

Klaus saidhe had no idea what was in his father's will or who had been named executor. He similarly had no knowledge of a life insurance policy or who the beneficiary might be.

But all along, he thought he would ultimately buy out his father when the time came and continue running the farm, he said.

"We were brought up a respectful family. There was no greed, no'I'm better than you,' " he said.

"We were a simple family. A hardworking family."