Highway of Tears missing-women inquiry 'not ruled out'
But attorney-general says priority is solving 18 aging cases

By Sam Cooper, The Province
November 13, 2009
http://www.theprovince.com/opinion/Highway+Tears+missing+women+inquiry+ruled/221\
7840/story.html



A stretch of Highway 16 between Smithers and Burns Lake. The highway is known as
the Highway of Tears.
Photograph by: Mikael Kjellstrom file photo, Canwest News Service
B.C. Attorney-General Mike de Jong says a public inquiry into the Highway of
Tears investigations is possible, but the first priority is solving the 18
cases.

"It's premature at this point to say anything other than there are a lot of
people that have too many unanswered questions," [but] "we're in an
investigation process," de Jong told The Province.

Pressed on whether an inquiry could proceed, de Jong said: "I don't rule it
out."

B.C. private eye Ray Michalko is a retired RCMP officer, but he's no fan of the
way the Mounties have handled the Highway of Tears murders.

That's why he has been "poking around" an unnamed Prince George-area hamlet,
conducting interviews about a man whose name "keeps popping up" - all part of
Michalko's personally funded investigation into nine of the 18 Highway of Tears
cases.

With a database of 600 people, Michalko has interviewed hundreds. The vast
majority won't talk to the police, he says, because they don't expect to be
taken seriously.

"When I'm asking [tipsters], 'Have you gone to the police?' and they say, 'Are
you nuts?' - that's a problem," Michalko said.

All but one of the missing women are aboriginal, and First Nations Highway of
Tears co-ordinator Mavis Erickson hints that racism could be a factor in botched
cases.

Erickson recently met with de Jong and B.C. Solicitor-General Kash Heed, pushing
for a public inquiry into the Highway of Tears investigations.

"As a First Nations mother and grandmother, I feel really angry because not a
lot has been done to solve these murders," she says. Investigations went cold
because more than once young women were reported missing and police didn't act,
Erickson said.

The case of Ramona Wilson seems to bolster Erickson's point.

Her sister, Brenda Wilson, told The Province that the 16-year-old said she was
going to visit a friend on Saturday, June 11, 1994. Her family became worried
when they didn't hear from her the next day, and they reported her missing to
Smithers RCMP. But police didn't respond until two weeks later, according to
Wilson.

"We were told, 'She's probably just with some friends,'" she said. "We felt very
helpless."

And four months before Wilson's remains were accidentally turned up by off-road
sport drivers, a tipster believed to be an aboriginal male called the Smithers
RCMP, saying the teen's body was near the Smithers airport. But the RCMP did not
tape the call, and couldn't follow up the lead, Wilson's mother, Matilda Wilson,
said.

While there are theories that a serial killer, possibly a trucker, is the
murderer behind the disappearances, Michalko believes at least several men
living near the highway are involved.

On Oct. 26, 35-year-old Jill Stacey Stuchenko - a Prince George prostitute with
addictions problems - was found dumped in a gravel pit outside town.

RCMP say it is too early to link the case to the 18 Highway of Tears files, but
cold-case investigators are receiving information on the Stuchenko murder.

RCMP Cpl. Annie Linteau said she can't comment on criticism that past Highway of
Tears investigations by the RCMP were flawed, but she maintained Mounties are
now pursuing the cold cases vigorously.

E-mail reporter Sam Cooper at scooper@...


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