AS THE MOTHERS OF THE VICTIMS clasped hands and spectators in the Toronto court gallery held a surreal silence, the jury foreman stood to deliver the verdict all Canada has waited for. He answered "guilty" to each of the nine charges against Paul Bernardo, a litany of terrible crimes involving the kidnapping, rape and murder of Leslie Mahaffy, 14, in 1991 and Kristen French, 15, in 1992. For the two counts of murder in the first degree, Bernardo received concurrent life sentences with no chance of parole for 25 years. He plans to appeal. The jury had deliberated seven hours to conclude the most horrific murder trial in the nation's history; the only surprise was that the decision took even that long.

For the jury, the case boiled down to the unsettling choice of which of two admitted sado-sexual torturers to believe. There was no denying that Bernardo, 31, and his then wife Karla Homolka, 25--who testified against him in exchange for a 12-year sentence--committed atrocities in their suburban home. The seemingly clean-cut couple had made videotapes of the torture sessions, which were not found by police but were later turned over by Bernardo's former defense attorney. The anguishing scenes depicted in the tapes stopped short of murder, giving each the opportunity to blame the other for the off-camera deaths of French and Mahaffy.

In a calm, emotionless voice, Homolka testified last June that she had watched as Bernardo strangled both girls. She had helped him rape her younger sister Tammy, 15, in December 1990 "to make him happy"-and thereafter, Homolka claimed, she was a battered wife, blackmailed into silence by Bernardo's threat to tell her parents about Tammy's fate. (Bernardo still faces charges relating to Tammy Homolka's death, as well as 28 rapes in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough.) The prosecution tried to bolster Homolka's claim that she was a victim by calling two expert witnesses to describe the couple's relationship. Asked for a definition of battered-wife syndrome, psychologist Peter Jaffe testified that such women feel powerless and can develop "maladaptive behavior," such as acting as accomplices to criminal acts.

But when Bernardo took the stand in his own defense last month, he coolly picked away at each part of his ex-wife's testimony. Capturing the girls was her idea, he insisted, and he was not even pres ent when she killed them. "I've caused a lot of sadness and sorrow to a lot of people, and I'm really sorry for that," he said in a chilling attempt at remorse. "But I didn't kill these girls." In light of the tapes, Bernardo at trial came across as "a classic sociopath," self-gratifying and showing no emotions, says psychologist and trial observer David Wolfe.

Using the videos-which show Homolka as a willing, even enthusiastic, participant-Bernardo's defense lawyer John Rosen sought to make her an equal partner in crime. "Driven by desires for young girls, they were matched action for action, minute for minute, perversion for perversion, kinkiness for kinkiness," Rosen said in his summation. "[Bernardo] may in fact be the devil incarnate ... but what he is not, members of the jury, is a murderer." The prosecution countered that the tapes "clearly show the accused as the prime mover and dominant person." Even if the jury chose not to believe that Homolka was a victim, lead attorney Ray Houlahan said, "How can one forget the sounds, the images, the dialogue on these tapes?"

In the end the savagery of the tapes convicted Bernardo, but it also raised questions about the justice of Homolka's light sentence--parole is possible as early as January 1997--which resulted from a 1993 plea bargain reached before prosecutors knew of the tapes' existence. Some Conservative members of the Ontario legislature have called for a review of the agreement. But legal experts say overturning the deal is not an option; a retrial would amount to double jeopardy.

If there is any real satisfaction to be found in this case it is in the efficient Canadian style of justice. Though hyped as the "trial of the century" at its start last May, the proceedings had few of the legal and media distractions endemic to that other "trial of the century" currently dragging on in Los Angeles. "The impact of the Bernardo trial has increased because it is running parallel to O.J. [Simpson's case]," says Canadian criminal lawyer Clay Ruby. "But I'd have to say our justice system comes off looking pretty good." Recent polls found that 75% of Canadians approved of the way the trial was conducted, and about 60% approved of the press coverage. Many newspapers prefaced stories with warnings of disturbing content.

For the victims' relatives, the verdict brings a chance of closure. "Only the trial is over--Leslie is still not coming home," said Dan Mahaffy, her father. "We have been through hell during the past four years and know there are many more months and years [of anguish] ahead of us."

--REPORTED BY SCOTT ANDERSON/TORONTO AND GAVIN SCOTT/OTTAWA