I wish people weren’t attacked in prison, but if it had to happen to someone….
Robert “Willie” Pickton was convicted of six counts of second-degree murder
Second degree!?
Good riddance! 
One more reason to never trust someone who owns a pig farm.
That’s half of Iowa.
I agree.
There’s what we know about what he did, and then there’s what the Crown can prove beyond a reasonable doubt in court, and these aren’t necessarily the same thing.
Good riddance.
Perhaps I’m misremembering, but there’s plenty of evidence to support charges for the murders of other women (I think he bragged he killed 46!) and that if ever it looked like he’d get parole they could potentially just lay charges for more. It’s been a long time since I think I read that in the news, I don’t actually know if that’s possible or probable.
Either way, good riddance.
Look at the picture on the OP thumbnail. He even looks like a serial killer. I’m sure his neighbors told reporters “Yeah, we always knew there was something wrong with that guy. Doesn’t surprise us in the least!”
He confessed to an undercover cop that he had killed 49 and was dismayed that he was one short of 50.
That’s my understanding as well. They got him on the charges they had him dead to rights on but they held a bunch more (in some way that kept them “fresh”, a Canadian legal doper would have to explain the specifics though) just in case. I believe he was not charged with all 49 because of a lack of evidence for some of the killings.
Spoiler coding it because it is gross: He apparently sold pig meat from his farm that was mixed with human remains.
Piker! I’ve killed 76. Oh wait, I wasn’t supposed to disclose that, was I? 
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Motel Hell is one of my favorite campy horror flicks -
But …
sentenced to life in prison in 2007, with the maximum parole ineligibility period of 25 years
There are obviously technical differences between first- and second-degree murder, and probably different minimum penalties, but no difference in the maximum. The sentence he got was the maximum anyone could have received for any crime, and there is no chance he would ever have been granted parole, so the second-degree charges instead of first degree was really just a technicality. I believe it’s different in the US.
I don’t think the Crown wanted to further highlight what a fucking miserable job the police did for years when it came to following up on the disappearance of so many women. Because they were sex workers, the homeless, and adicts, the cops just didn’t care.