Three days after the D-Day invasion in June 1944, the British army occupied a Normandy mansion called Chateau d'Audrieu and found a row of 13 Canadian soldiers lying dead along a fence. So began Canada's first war-crimes investigations. They became a drawn-out and unsatisfying process, which would determine that more than 150 Canadians were massacred in Normandy by members of the 12th SS Panzer Division, but which would bring only one man to trial.

Since then, Canada has had a spotty six-decade record in bringing war criminals to justice, with as many failures as successes. This fall marks the 60th anniversary of Canada's tarnished legacy of prosecution - and even today, war criminals don't always pay for their crimes.