Ranter
05-17-2007, 12:41 AM
From the Globe & Mail:
WINNIPEG — For 23 years, Wilma Derksen has wondered what happened to her 13-year-old daughter.
Candace Derksen was walking home after school on Nov. 30, 1984, when she was abducted from a busy Winnipeg street. She wasn't seen again until mid-January when an employee looking for an old saw found her frozen body in a remote shed, less than half a kilometre from her parent's home.
More than two decades after the mystery began, Winnipeg police believe they've cracked Candace's case through DNA testing.
As police detailed the arrest Wednesday of Mark Edward Grant, 43, Ms. Derksen sat glassy-eyed, her mouth in a thin line until asked about her daughter.
(...)
This moment came because their daughter's case was assigned to the newly formed Winnipeg police Cold Case Unit in 2006, said Chief Jack Ewatski.
Chief Ewatski said investigators re-examined the forensic evidence in the case, sending the results to an independent Canadian lab for testing. He gave few details.
Based on DNA tests, officers in the unit arrested Grant Wednesday morning. Grant has been charged with first-degree murder.
Read the complete article here: http://tinyurl.com/2ua747
I remember this case like it was yesterday. I grew up in Manitoba, and it was on the news every night from shortly after she went missing until 7 weeks later when they found her body. I was the same age as Candace, so all us kids were following the case closely. It was probably the second-highest profile murder ever to happen in Winnipeg, after the 1981 Barbara Stopel murder.
I'm reading the book written by Candace's mother, Wilma Derksen, right now. It's called Have You Seen Candace? It's an hour by hour account of what she and her husband went through after her daughter's disappearance. It's been on my shelf for a couple years, but I just opened it up after news of this arrest.
The police incompetence and arrogance early in the case really jumps out at the reader. They kept insisting she was a runaway for days after she went missing. Meanwhile, she was freezing to death, bound and gagged in a shed about 500 yards from her home. It was the community that rallied around the family early on, organizing search parties while the police were still telling them that Candace would likely show up for school on Monday morning. After the body was found, they decided that Candace's own father was their chief suspect. They really didn't have a clue.
Thank God for DNA. I hope this scumbag spends a long and miserable existence in prison, and I hope the other prisoners use him to satisfy their own perverted desires.
WINNIPEG — For 23 years, Wilma Derksen has wondered what happened to her 13-year-old daughter.
Candace Derksen was walking home after school on Nov. 30, 1984, when she was abducted from a busy Winnipeg street. She wasn't seen again until mid-January when an employee looking for an old saw found her frozen body in a remote shed, less than half a kilometre from her parent's home.
More than two decades after the mystery began, Winnipeg police believe they've cracked Candace's case through DNA testing.
As police detailed the arrest Wednesday of Mark Edward Grant, 43, Ms. Derksen sat glassy-eyed, her mouth in a thin line until asked about her daughter.
(...)
This moment came because their daughter's case was assigned to the newly formed Winnipeg police Cold Case Unit in 2006, said Chief Jack Ewatski.
Chief Ewatski said investigators re-examined the forensic evidence in the case, sending the results to an independent Canadian lab for testing. He gave few details.
Based on DNA tests, officers in the unit arrested Grant Wednesday morning. Grant has been charged with first-degree murder.
Read the complete article here: http://tinyurl.com/2ua747
I remember this case like it was yesterday. I grew up in Manitoba, and it was on the news every night from shortly after she went missing until 7 weeks later when they found her body. I was the same age as Candace, so all us kids were following the case closely. It was probably the second-highest profile murder ever to happen in Winnipeg, after the 1981 Barbara Stopel murder.
I'm reading the book written by Candace's mother, Wilma Derksen, right now. It's called Have You Seen Candace? It's an hour by hour account of what she and her husband went through after her daughter's disappearance. It's been on my shelf for a couple years, but I just opened it up after news of this arrest.
The police incompetence and arrogance early in the case really jumps out at the reader. They kept insisting she was a runaway for days after she went missing. Meanwhile, she was freezing to death, bound and gagged in a shed about 500 yards from her home. It was the community that rallied around the family early on, organizing search parties while the police were still telling them that Candace would likely show up for school on Monday morning. After the body was found, they decided that Candace's own father was their chief suspect. They really didn't have a clue.
Thank God for DNA. I hope this scumbag spends a long and miserable existence in prison, and I hope the other prisoners use him to satisfy their own perverted desires.