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A 2001 Vancouver Sun article listing the missing
Since 1980 in B.C., there have been 40 unsolved murders of women who
either worked in the sex trade or were vulnerable to predators
because they used drugs, lived on the street, hitched rides with
strangers, or earned their living as exotic dancers. These are the
open files:
SQUAMISH
Oct. 29, '85: Rachel Turley, 20
Turley's body was found in a wooded area near Squamish. She had been
sexually assaulted, beaten and strangled. Police say she was known
to them as a Granville Mall "street person" who once worked as a
prostitute.
CAMPBELL RIVER
Aug. '99: Laura Lee Banman, 23
Banman, who worked in the sex trade, was last seen in Nanaimo in the
middle of August. Two people picking ferns on an overgrown logging
road north of Campbell River discovered Banman's skeletal remains
the following May.
SHAWNIGAN LAKE
June 8, '91: Melissa Maureen Nicholson, 17
Nicholson, who worked as a prostitute in Victoria, was last seen
getting into a pickup truck at the corner of Gordon and Courtney.
Her body was found beside a gravel road south of Shawnigan Lake.
Dec. 2, 2000: Carla Slots, 29
Slots, who was addicted to drugs and worked in Victoria's sex trade,
was found murdered on a logging road in a remote area of Shawnigan
Lake. She had been beaten to death.
BURNS LAKE
July, '94: Roxanne Thiara, 15
Thiara, who worked as a prostitute in Prince George, disappeared the
July long weekend. Her body was found Aug. 17 in the bush along
Highway 16, six kilometres east of Burns Lake.
PRINCE GEORGE
Dec. 9, '94: Alishia Germaine, 15,
Three teenaged boys found Germaine dead of multiple stab wounds
behind an elementary school in Prince George. She had worked as a
prostitute, but friends claimed she stopped two weeks before her
death.
KAMLOOPS
May 8, '81: Maureen Elizabeth Mosie, 33
Mosie's battered body was found beside a road near Kamloops. Mosie,
who was from Edson, Alta., was hitchhiking between Salmon Arm and
Kamloops.
PEMBERTON
April, '97: Kari Anne Gordon, 26
Gordon, who worked in Vancouver's sex trade, vanished in late April
1997.
Her body was found on the shores of Little Lillooet Lake near
Pemberton in the spring of 1998.
MISSION
Aug. 1, '95: Victoria Younker, 35
Younker disappeared from Vancouver, where she worked as a
prostitute. Her decomposed body was discovered in October beside a
logging road in a remote area northeast of Mission. Police suspect
her death is linked to the murders of Tracy Olajide and others.
SAANICH
June 4, '90: Cheri Lynn Smith, 18
Smith was working as prostitute in Victoria at the time of her
disappearance. Her decomposed body was found in a regional park in
September. She had been beaten to death. Police at one time
considered the possibility her murder was linked to the murders of
three other women:
Karen-Lee Taylor (Vancouver), Kimberley Gallup (Victoria) and
Melissa Nicholson (Shawnigan Lake).
SOOKE
Dec. 3, '82: Kristie Kathleen Fowlie, 18
Fowlie's partly clad body was found next to a logging road east of
Sooke.
She had worked as a prostitute, but had become a born-again
Christian. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled.
ESQUIMALT
Feb. 25, '86: Chantal Marie Venne, 21
Venne, who worked as a prostitute, was found strangled with the belt
of her coat. Her hands were bound and she had been tortured and
sexually assaulted.
VICTORIA
Nov. '83: Donna Mitchell, 31
Mitchell, who worked as a prostitute, was found buried in a shallow
grave in Beacon Hill Park. She had been missing since June and
police believe she was strangled. Police had a suspect who died
before being charged.
Nov. 21, '90: Kimberley Gallup, 17
Gallup was working as a prostitute and was picked up by a man
wearing a neon-pink and green ski jacket. She was found at 4 a.m. in
a room at the Colony Motor Inn. She had been strangled.
AGASSIZ
Aug. 10, '95: Tracy Olajide, 30
Olajide, who worked as a prostitute in Vancouver, was found dead in
the woods near Agassiz. Police, who believe she fell victim to a
serial killer, recently cleared the prime suspect using DNA
analysis.
Aug. 29, '95: Tammy Lee Pipe, 24
Pipe's body was found just eight kilometres from where Olajide's was
discovered. Police believe they were killed by the same person.
KELOWNA
Sept. 25, '94: Tina Louise Parr, 25
Parr's partially clad body was found in the Knox Mountain Park area.
Police said she had worked as a prostitute.
VERNON
June 8, '97: Naiomi Skye, 25
Skye disappeared from her hometown of Vernon and her remains were
found near there in November. She used drugs, but did not usually
work in the sex trade. Police do not believe her murder is linked to
others.
DAWSON CREEK
July 17, '90: Cindy Burk, 21
The Yukon woman was hitchhiking south along the Alaska Highway and
was last seen in Prophet River on July 17. A week later, her body
was found near the Kiskatinaw Provincial Park.
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LOWER MAINLAND
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NORTH VANCOUVER
Dec. 28, '89: Bonnie Kate Whalen, 32
Whalen, who worked the Mount Pleasant stroll, was last seen alive in
the 900-block East Broadway and reported missing a month later. Her
remains were discovered near the Seymour River on April 2, 1990.
July 1, '95: Mary Lidguerre, 30
Lidguerre, who worked the streets near Main and Hastings,
disappeared in July. Her skeletal remains were found two years later
on Mount Seymour in North Vancouver. Police suspect she may have
fallen prey to the person who killed Tracy Olajide and others.
RICHMOND
Aug. 24, '82: Heather Gloria Nelson, 19
Nelson's decomposed body was found in a bush area near No. 5 Road. A
known prostitute with the street name Wanda, she worked the corner
of Bute and Davie.
Nov. 3, '89: Umi Omar O'Brien, 34
O'Brien, who worked as a prostitute in Vancouver, was last seen
shortly after midnight in the 1500-block Powell Street. Her body was
found the next day in a rain-filled ditch in Richmond.
June 1, '97: Cassandra Lailoni Antone, 20
Antone, the mother of a five-month old baby, worked as a prostitute
in the Main and Hastings area of Vancouver. Her charred body was
found by a hiker in a remote area of Richmond.
VANCOUVER
Jan. 12, '80: Anita Threlfall, 24
Threlfall, who was working as a prostitute, was found murdered in
the north lane of the 200 block West Fifth. She had been strangled.
Feb. 21, '85: Linda Joyce Tatrai, 18
Tatrai, who was involved in drugs and the sex trade, was found in an
underground parking lot in the 1400-block East Broadway. She was
stabbed to death.
April 3, '88: Rose Minnie Peters, 28
Peters, who worked as a prostitute, was found strangled, beaten and
sexually assaulted in the 4900-block St. Catherines.
April 7, '88: Marjorie Madeline Vedan, 41
A mother of four who worked as a prostitute near Main and Hastings,
Vedan was stabbed numerous times in her apartment on East Seventh.
Aug. 13, '88: Lisa Marie Gavin, 21
Worked as a prostitute in Mount Pleasant, was beaten, sexually
assaulted and strangled. Her body was found in a lane behind
6400-block Knight.
Sept. 11, '88: Connie Christenson, 27
Christenson, a prostitute, was found slain in her apartment on
Kingsway. She was severely beaten and stabbed.
Sept. 30, '88: Glenna Marie Sowan, 25
A prostitute who used the street name Dusty,Sowan was found murdered
in the south lane of the 700-block West 24th Avenue. A mother of an
infant, she had been beaten and strangled.
Oct. 7, '88: Tracey Leigh Chartrand, 25
Worked as a prostitute in Mount Pleasant, went missing in October,
1988. Her skeletal remains were found the following spring in a
shallow grave on the University Endowment Lands.
Aug. 25, '90: Karen-Lee Violet Taylor, 19
Taylor's body was found on a plastic sheet in the 3600-block of Pine
Crescent in Shaughnessy. She had been strangled. Police at the time
said there was no evidence she worked as a prostitute, but described
her as having a "free lifestyle."
Nov. 21, '91: Bernadine Standingready, 26
Standingready's body was found in an auto-wrecking yard in the
700-block Cordova. She had been beaten to death. Police said she had
a record for soliciting.
March 2, '93: Vicki Rosalind Black. 23
Black's body was found in a dumpster in the south lane of the
2000-block Hastings wrapped in a grey sheet with patterned squares.
She had worked as a prostitute.
BURNABY
June 20, '87: Carol Ruby Davis, 29
Davis, a Granville Mall regular and a known drug user, was stabbed
numerous times in the neck and chest. Her partly clad body was found
in a bush close to Wiggins Avenue in Burnaby. She was a mother of
two.
MAPLE RIDGE
May 31, '89: Katherine Mary Lou Daignault, 40
Daignault had just returned from Winnipeg when her beaten body was
found at a Maple Ridge construction site. Her street name was Nicky
and she was known to work as a prostitute near Main and Hastings.
COQUITLAM
April 1, '85: Pauline Eliza Johnson, 30
An exotic dancer, Johnson was stabbed in the heart and her partly
clad body left lying near a gravel road in Coquitlam. She was
sexually assaulted, mutilated with a knife, her body cleaned up,
then dumped from a car.
SURREY
Aug. 21, '86: Donna Rose Kiss, 25
Kiss was strangled with a tie. Her body was dumped near 56A Avenue
and 136th Street. She had worked as a prostitute in Vancouver's West
End until a soliciting conviction banned her from the popular
stroll.
Jan. 18, '98: Kelly Elizabeth Parsons, 30
Parsons, who worked as a prostitute, was last seen walking in the
13200-block of King George Highway. She was found unconscious in
pool of blood beside 133rd Street near 112 Avenue and died of head
injuries.
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