Missing and Murdered Women: September 2012

Thursday, September 27

E-PANA Team Receives Over 100 Tips After Announcement Tuesday

Wednesday, September 26, 2012 - 5:25 PM
By Julie O'Connor
Prince George, BC

Members of the E-PANA investigative team were in Prince George today to further discuss their announcement into 18 cases of missing and murdered women in northern BC.

Inspector Gary Shinkaruk says since their announcement yesterday about Bobby Jack Fowler being linked to the death of Colleen MacMillen in 1974, they've received a number of calls in regards to information about Fowler and his presence in BC in the 70s.

"We've gotten a tremendous amount of response. We've gotten over a hundred calls and tips. We've gotten calls from all over BC, we've been getting calls from the States, and we fully expect there's going to be more coming."

Shinkaruk says putting Fowler to the Highway 16 corridor is of great importance to the RCMP, but they need more information.

He says there's a large gap in time in which they don't know where he was.

At one point in time he escaped from jail in the States and nobody knew where he was, and Shinkaruk says since there is large periods of time where Fowler was not in contact with the police, it makes them wonder where he was.

If you have any information you can contact your local RCMP detachment or Crimestoppers.

Serial killer Bobby Fowler probably not the main Highway of Tears murderer, profiler says

Expert in geographic profiling says time and place match for southern B.C. killings, but not northern ones

BY LORI CULBERT, VANCOUVER SUN SEPTEMBER 27, 2012 6:09 PM

Bobby Fowler, a.k.a. Bobby Jack Fowler, in a booking photo from 1995. A geographic profiler says Fowler is probably not the Hwy. 16 killer.

Photograph by: Vancouver Sun, Handout

Former Vancouver police geographic profiler Kim Rossmo believes a serial killer is responsible for many of the deaths along Highway 16 in the past two decades, but he does not believe Bobby Jack Fowler is the suspect.

Police investigating the deaths and disappearances of 18 young women from three B.C. highways announced this week that Fowler, who died in a U.S. prison in 2006, killed one victim in 1974 and is a “strong suspect” in the deaths of two others from 1973, all of them near Kamloops.

Police say Fowler has not been eliminated as a suspect for seven other victims on their list, whose deaths span 40 years and many hundreds of kilometres.

Rossmo, who was among the first to predict a serial killer was preying on women from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, said it is reasonable that Fowler could be responsible for the three deaths in the 1970s, which all happened close to Kamloops. Bit, in his opinion, it doesn’t make sense that Fowler would have also killed nine young women who vanished along Highway 16 in Northern B.C. between 1989 and 2006.

“It is extremely unlikely, almost to the point of impossibility, given the time frame and when he was arrested,” Rossmo said in a phone interview from Texas State University, where he is a criminal justice professor.

Rossmo, who has a PhD and created the geographic profiling unit at the Vancouver police department, said timing and proximity are key when determining whether one suspect is responsible for multiple crimes.

It made sense, for example, to conclude there was a serial killer preying on sex-trade workers in the Downtown Eastside because they were disappearing from the same neighbourhood over a set period of time, from 1995 to 2001.

Rossmo analyzed the 18 highway cases being investigated by an RCMP team dubbed Project E-Pana for The Vancouver Sun.

The first nine victims on the list, including the women Fowler has been linked to, disappeared from widely separated places in the province between 1969 and 1983.

The last nine women, however, all vanished between 1989 to 2006 along Highway 16 between Prince Rupert and Prince George, a lonely stretch of road dubbed the Highway of Tears.

Rossmo believes a serial killer is responsible for some or all of those cases.

However, he argues it cannot be Fowler, who was arrested in Oregon for a serious crime in 1995 and therefore was likely in jail when the last four women on the list were killed. He is also a suspect in the deaths of four women in Oregon from 1992 to 1995.

“He almost is not in the picture in Canada during the Highway of Tears cases,” Rossmo said.

E-Pana investigators say they also don’t believe one person murdered all 18 victims on their list, but are open to the possibility that a serial killer was responsible for some of the cases.

They have asked for tips from the public about Fowler’s movements before his incarceration in the 1990s, arguing he was a drifter who moved frequently in the United States and at least once, in 1974, to Prince George.

Police have DNA evidence linking Fowler to Colleen MacMillen, whose body was found near 100 Mile House, but no DNA yet to conclusively tie him to Gale Weys and Pamela Darlington, whose bodies were found near Kamloops.

Connie Menton’s niece Leah Germaine was murdered in 1994 in Prince George, and is among the cluster of cases that Rossmo believes could be related. Menton believes her niece’s death is related to another 1994 victim, Roxanne Thiara, but isn’t convinced they are linked to the other cases or to Fowler.

“The police are not gong to convince me that [Fowler] had anything to do with Leah,” Menton said in an interview. “I hope it is true for Colleen and there is closure for that family.”

Brenda Wilson, whose sister Ramona’s body was found in 1995 outside Smithers along Hwy. 16, said in a brief email to The Sun that she understands E-Pana is continuing to investigate Fowler “and Ramona’s case is not eliminated as of yet.”

Mavis Erickson, a former Highway of Tears coordinator in Prince George who worked with many of the families, said she is happy the MacMillens have some answers.

“For the rest of the Highway of Tears, I think it raises hope. I don’t know if that is good ... You still have the other 17 families without any resolution,” Erickson said.

“It’s time for the public to really keep the pressure up on the RCMP that it’s not over. There’s still work to do.”

lculbert@vancouversun.com

CBC.ca | Daybreak North | Vanished

CBC.ca | Daybreak North | Vanished:

There has been a lot of focus on the missing women of northern British Columbia, but it can be a dangerous place for men, as well. In this special series, Daybreak takes a look at some men who have vanished into B.C.'s north.

The numbers of missing men

'via Blog this'

Wednesday, September 26

Highway of Tears: Victim's family makes emotional plea for tips

THE CANADIAN PRESS SEPTEMBER 26, 2012

U.S. and Canadian authorities have linked a dead Oregon inmate to the slayings of two teens, one being the 1974 killing of 16-year-old Colleen MacMillen in northern British Columbia, according to the Oregonian.

Photograph by: Submitted, The Oregonian

KAMLOOPS — Sisters of a 19-year-old woman who was murdered in the early 1970s have made an emotional appeal to the public for information that could solve the crime.

A day after police said they believed Bobby Jack Fowler was a "strong suspect" in the death of 19-year-olds Gale Weys and Pamela Darlington, Weys' two younger sisters asked people to recall tips from four decades past.

Denice Weys and Dianne Weddell say they had given up hope the crime would ever be solved and that their "open wound" resolved.

Police on Tuesday announced they had linked Fowler, a dead Oregon convict, through DNA to the death of Colleen MacMillen, a 16-year-old murdered in 1974.

Fowler was also named as a suspect in the Weys and Darlington deaths on Tuesday and RCMP Staff Sgt. Wayne Clary says since then, investigators have already received 50 phone calls to a tip line, as well as numerous emails.

The deaths are part of an investigation known as E-Pana that has tried to determine whether one or more serial killers have been working B.C. highways, including Highway 16, known as the Highway of Tears.

Public statement from Gale Wey's sisters:

Hello, (I am) Denice Weys and (I am) Dianne Weddell and Gale was our older sister. We have a statement to read on behalf of our family.

Second in a family of 9, Gale was the quintessential older sister, always supportive and protective of her younger siblings. She was a tomboy, fiercely independent and enjoying all types of outdoor adventure and activities, dragging us, her siblings and friends along for the fun. Whether it was teaching us to ride a bike, how to swim, or organizing a hike and exploration of the surrounding hills it was an all for one and one for all attitude. With an infectious laugh and sharp sense of humour she was a natural leader and challenged others to go beyond the limits they had set themselves. She loved amusement park rides and at the local fair or the PNE always cajoled others onto the fastest, highest, scariest rides. Achieving high grades in school, she enjoyed learning and in turn tutoring her younger siblings including teaching them to read before even entering school. A childhood spent in first Brownies, Guides, then Rangers culminated in becoming a leader herself. As a teenager she earned her National Lifeguard Certificate and taught swimming lessons. As a volunteer she worked with and taught special needs children.

Within the Guiding organization Gale traveled a number of places, Expo 66, the Northwest Territories and Mexico City creating a desire to explore more of the world. It was during that trip to Mexico that Gale’s sensitive and compassionate nature became aware of the stark poverty and suffering that exists in the world and instilled a desire to somehow help alleviate it.

Having just moved away from home Gale was living and working in Clearwater exploring a newly independent stage of life as a young adult.

She was working two jobs to save money for a trip to Mexico but always knew that the role of motherhood; her strongest aspiration, was what the future held for her.

These dreams and many others yet to be created were never fulfilled as life was taken from her, and she from us, violently, painfully and abruptly.

As a family we truly never thought this open wound would be resolved in any way; we had given up hope. We are grateful for the ongoing work by the police over the years on Gale's behalf and this new development that offers some answers and relief. Unfortunately, as the police have stated this compelling evidence is not definitive proof. To that end we, Gale's family, are asking people to think back to that time in the early 70's.

If you have any memories of this man Fowler or recollections of these events please contact the police tip line or crime stoppers. Perhaps you found her clothing and didn't understand what you had found; perhaps you met or worked with this man. Perhaps he assaulted you in some way, made you feel uncomfortable or maybe he was involved in a bar fight. Anything could be hugely helpful, even if you are not 100% certain it's truly related, or you think it's just trivial. If fear has kept you silent, Fowler can no longer hurt you in any way, so please come forward. For our family and other families that are going through the loss of a loved one there is still that uncertainty of not knowing; questions and emotions left hanging. If you can help in any way please do so for Gale and all the other women.

This is all we wish to say at this time, we ask if you have further questions please direct them to the police and respect our family's privacy.

BASS: Highway of Tears work shows police at their very best

By Kamloops This Week
Published: September 26, 2012 04:00 PM
Updated: September 26, 2012 04:164 PM

As someone who has never hesitated to criticize the police, it’s time to heap on the praise.

And pile on the thanks, as well, for the work they’ve done in bringing some amount of closure to at least one family.

Closure’s a funny word; do you ever really shut the door on the pain that hijacks your DNA when your child/sibling/friend is murdered?

Whatever the emotion is that they are feeling, the family of Colleen MacMillen is at least experiencing it, thanks to the dedication of the officers who have continued to try to solve the murders of women in the B.C. Interior.

What they’ve done cannot have been easy.

It must have been frustrating, infuriating, demanding and simply daunting, but they kept at it and, in addition to the information they’ve been able to share with the MacMillens about what happened to their teenaged daughter in 1974, they’ve been able to tell two other families with Kamloops connections they think the embodiment of evil once known asBobby Jack Fowler also killed their loved ones.

I’m sure that team of detectives working on the task force feels emboldened now, perhaps even starting to believe it will be able to close a few more of the files that represent dead women in the province.

Let’s hope the task force can.

But, it’s also important to acknowledge that kind of work.

For every Monty Robinson wielding a taser or crashing a car, there are dozens of other officers who take the gravitas of the badge and the calling seriously and who treat it with reverence.

They just want to do good, protect us all and make it home to their own families every night.

I simply can’t imagine that kind of mindset, that kind of determination and commitment.

Heck, I stopped covering hard news, for the most part, here at KTW and moved into entertainment just because it became too hard, too painful to interview some of the marginalized people who came across my path in the last dozen years.

I stopped wanting to meet them because I was tired of knowing them when their bodies were found.

It started with Heather Hamill, whose death I covered for KTW.

At her memorial service, I met and spent a lot of time talking with Shana Labatte.

We hit it off and I’d stop and talk to her if I saw her on the street after that night.

Those conversations ended when her body was found.

Later, I got to know a lovely woman who was also homeless, a lost soul fighting her own demons.

She died when she fell into a campfire down by the river.

At her memorial service, emotions were pretty raw and one woman couldn’t handle it.

She stepped outside of the New Life Mission and broke down.

I followed her out, tried to console her and spent more than an hour talking with her.

Her name was Sheri Hiltz and, the next day, her body was found on the North Shore.

Even something as fun as a big birthday party for the women at the House of Ruth brought its own pain later.

I met a wonderful woman there who gave me a necklace that night, saying it was a symbol of our friendship.

I’d see her often afterwards and we’d say hi, share a few minutes.

Her name was Leah Cardinal and it is her memorial you see next to a street sign at the west end of Victoria Street.

Those were just minor moments in a life, but they brought with them such pain and anger. It’s why I can’t imagine how these officers get up every day and go out and do it again.

Look for the monsters.

Hope they find them.

They’re good people doing a dreadful job.

The next time one of their colleagues does something stupid and makes another headline, we should remember those who won’t get those headlines.

This week, they got the right headlines and they deserve our thanks.

Dale Bass is a reporter with Kamloops This Week. Her email address is here. Her blog can be found here.

Find this article at:
http://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/opinion/171425351.html

Family of of Highway of Tears victim Gale Weys appeals for tips

Killer Bobby Jack Fowler is a supect in 19-year-old's murder in 1973

BY LORI CULBERT, VANCOUVER SUN SEPTEMBER 26, 2012 2:08 PM

Gale Weys was killed in Clearwater in 1973.

Photograph by: Handout, Vancouver Sun

The family of Highway of Tears victim Gale Weys is appealing to the public to provide any tips to police about her suspected killer, Bobby Jack Fowler.

The RCMP said Tuesday that Fowler, a U.S. convict who died in prison in 2006, was a "strong suspect" in the unsolved cold case of Weys, 19, who disappeared from Clearwater in 1973 and was found dead six months later.

"As a family we truly never thought this open wound would be resolved in any way; we had given up hope," Weys' two sisters, Denice Weys and Dianne Weddell, said in a statement released today.

"We are grateful for the ongoing work by the police over the years on Gale's behalf and this new development that offers some answers and relief. Unfortunately, as the police have stated this compelling evidence is not definitive proof. To that end we, Gale's family, are asking people to think back to that time in the early 70's."

"If you have any memories of this man Fowler or recollections of these events please contact the police tip line or crime stoppers."

Weys' sisters released the statement after officers with the RCMP's E-Pana Project -- the investigation into the 18 girls and women who were found murdered or went missing along the so-called Highway of Tears in B.C. -- held a press conference in Kamloops today to inform local media about their search for information about Fowler.

The sisters asked the public to notify police about anything they can recall about Fowler or Weys' case, no matter how big or small.

"Perhaps you found her clothing and didn't understand what you had found; perhaps you met or worked with this man. Perhaps he assaulted you in some way, made you feel uncomfortable or maybe he was involved in a bar fight," the statement said.

"If fear has kept you silent, Fowler can no longer hurt you in any way, so please come forward. For our family and other families that are going through the loss of a loved one there is still that uncertainty of not knowing; questions and emotions left hanging. If you can help in any way please do so for Gale and all the other women."

Click here to see photos of women missing and murdered on Highway of Tears

Police announced on Tuesday that DNA proves Fowler killed another woman on the Highway of Tears list, 16-year-old Colleen MacMillen who went missing from Lac La Hache in 1974.

Investigators also revealed Fowler was a "strong suspect" in the cases of Weys and Pamela Darlington, whose body was found in the Kamloops area in 1973.

All three women were believed to have been hitchhiking when last seen.

Police said Fowler was eliminated in eight of the Highway of Tears cases, but could be a person of interest in the remaining ones.

Fowler was known to travel extensively through the United States in old cars and had an extensive criminal record for violent offences.

Weys, 19, disappeared in October 1973 when she left the service station where she worked in Clearwater to hitchhike to her parents’ house in Kamloops.

Her nude, decomposed body was found half a year later just off Highway 5, in a water-filled ditch south of Clearwater.

At the time of her killing, Const. Ron Hunchiak described Gale as a wholesome teen who taught Girl Guides and wasn’t into drugs.

A month after Weys disappeared, Darlington, 19, of Kamloops, vanished while hitchhiking to a local bar. The next day, her partly clothed, badly beaten body was found face down in the Thompson River at Pioneer Park in Kamloops.

The only clue officers had was from a passing train crew, who reported seeing a 1950s off-white or salmon-pink rusty Chrysler coming out of a park along the river, and being driven erratically.

Police reviewing these three cases in 1981 released a sketch of an old car that was a possible suspect vehicle in the case.

Project E-Pana was formed in 2006 to review these and other cases.

Anyone with information about Bobby Jack Fowler is asked to call 1-877-543-4822.

E-Pana by the numbers:

— 726 boxes of evidence to that was thoroughly search for the 10 cases

— 1,413 persons of interest investigated, and almost 90 per cent have been eliminated as suspects

— 750 DNA samples collected

— 100 plus polygraph tests conducted

— 2,500 people interviewed

— 17,984 investigative inquiries to pursue: 75 per cent of those have been done.

Click here to see photos of women missing and murdered on Highway of Tears

Click here to see more photos related to this story

Family's tears flow as highway killer named

RCMP say U.S. convict responsible for murder

BY LORI CULBERT AND TIFFANY CRAWFORD, POSTMEDIA NEWS SEPTEMBER 26, 2012 6:32 AM curriebarracks

In the summer of 1974, Colleen MacMillen, a pretty, strawberry-blond teenager, left her Lac La Hache home to hitchhike just a few kilometres to her friend's house.

Even though hitchhiking was a common practice in the 1970s, Colleen never made it to her destination. Her body was found one month later beside a logging road south of 100 Mile House.

"Colleen was a lovely, sweet, innocent 16-year-old kid, and there are still no words in the world to express how terribly she was wronged," her tearyeyed brother, Shawn MacMillen, told a packed RCMP news conference Tuesday.

Her heartbroken family was left without answers for 38 years. The RCMP revealed it now believes a U.S. convict, Bobby Jack Fowler, killed MacMillen.

The Oregon man, who died in prison in 2006 while serving a sentence for kidnapping, attempted rape and assault, has also been linked to the deaths of four teenagers in the U.S.

It's now known that in 1974 Fowler was in B.C., working as a roofer for Happy's Roofing in Prince George, which is 291 kilometres north of MacMillen's hometown, along Highway 97.

"He was extremely violent. He was also very charming and disarming at some times. People told us his personality could change on a moment's notice," said RCMP Insp. Gary Shinkaruk.

Shinkaruk is head of Project E-Pana, which is investigating the so-called Highway of Tears case - the murders and disappearances of 18 girls and women along Highways 16, 97 and 5 in B.C., between 1969 and 2006.

It was modern-day testing of 38-year-old DNA seized from MacMillen's body that led police to Fowler, who had not been on E-Pana's radar before.

Shinkaruk said Fowler is now considered a "strong suspect" in the cases of two other women from the Highway of Tears list, Gale Weys and Pamela Darlington. However, that has not been conclusively proven through DNA.

While Fowler has been ruled out as the killer in eight of the Highway of Tears cases, investigators are "fully open to the possibility" he could be a suspect in the remaining files.

One of the files, although not linked to Fowler, was for Nicole Hoar, 25, of Red Deer. She vanished in 2002 while apparently hitchhiking from Prince George to meet her sister in Smithers, B.C.

Police do not believe a single killer is responsible for murdering all 18 victims, but investigators have long said there are similarities in the cases of MacMillen, Weys and Darlington.

Weys, 19, disappeared in October 1973 when she left the service station where she worked in Clearwater to hitchhike to her parents' house in Kamloops.

Her nude, decomposed body was found half a year later just off Highway 5, in a water-filled ditch south of Clearwater.

At the time of her killing, Const. Ron Hunchiak described Gale as a wholesome teen who taught Girl Guides and wasn't into drugs.

The only clue officers had was from a passing train crew, who reported seeing a 1950s off-white or salmon-pink rusty Chrysler coming out of a park along the river, and being driven erratically.

Police reviewing these three cases in 1981 released a sketch of an old car that was a possible suspect vehicle in the case.

Project E-Pana was formed in 2006 to review these and other cases.

In June 2007, investigators sent evidence from Colleen's case to the RCMP lab for DNA testing. A profile of a man was produced, but it was not good enough quality to be matched with a name in the National Crime Scene Databank.

In 2012, police asked for the profile to be re-examined by the lab because of advances in DNA technology. That resulted in a higher quality sample being produced, which was submitted to Interpol for comparison to offenders in databanks in other countries.

On May 3, 2012, Oregon authorities indicated the DNA matched Fowler, who has an extensive criminal history with convictions in several U.S. states for crimes including attempted murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, sexual assault, arson and weapons offences.

E-Pana investigators have since probed Fowler's movements over the past 40 years, contacting 31 U.S. law enforcement agencies and 11 prisons and speaking to Americans who knew him.

The RCMP has also tried to track down people who knew Fowler in B.C., including coworkers at Happy's Roofing which is no longer in business, but still don't know how often he was in this province.

The RCMP's interest in Fowler prompted authorities in the U.S. to have a closer look at cases with similarities to MacMillen's, said Ron Benson of the district attorney's office in Lincoln County, Oregon.

Anyone with information about Bobby Jack Fowler is asked to call 1-877-543-4822.