EDMONTON – Lawyers are making final arguments about whether a youth’s confession to an undercover police officer should be allowed at his double murder trial.

The 17-year-old is charged with killing Barry Boenke (BOING’-kee) and Susan Trudel at a rural property east of Edmonton in June 2009.

Defence lawyer Mona Duckett told the judge that the RCMP had tunnel vision, wanted a quick arrest and never really looked for the real killer.

She said the Mounties wasted time and, by her estimate, about $200,000 on two police stings involving the accused and another teen.

Duckett said the youth had mental deficiencies and was taken advantage of by police rather than protected as a ward of the government.

She also suggested that there were no safeguards in place to make sure the information he was telling undercover officers was correct.

The youth was the subject of an extended “Mr. Big” police operation aimed at making him think he was being recruited into a large and powerful crime syndicate.

He has retracted his confession, saying he told an officer posing as a crook that he committed the murders in an effort to gain respect.