Opinion: Looking back at Just Another Indian

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Almost two decades ago I began writing Just Another Indian: A Serial
Killer and Canada’s Indifference.

That part of the process followed a five-year journey through the
justice system, that began with the discovery of the remains of three
Aboriginal women in a grove south of Saskatoon. Their names are Eva Taysup,
Calinda Waterhen and Shelley Napope, who at the age of 16 when she disappeared,
was the youngest.

The early days of the RCMP
investigation were an exercise in deception and behind-the-scenes intrigue and
trickery that soon resulted in the arrest of a low-life character by the name
of John Martin Crawford. A simple man who fit the profile of many serial
killers, Crawford had killed a woman in Lethbridge in 1981. Despite the
ferocity of the crime – sexual in nature and clearly intentional – Crawford was
allowed to enter a guilty plea on a manslaughter charge and wound up serving
less than ten years in prison.

It was Mary Jane Serloin’s sister, Justine, who commented that the
case was barely covered by the local media and the police and court officials
didn’t even bother to tell her family that Crawford would be appearing in
court.

“It seems that any time a Native is murdered, it isn’t a major
case,” Justine told me.

“It’s just another dead Indian.”

That chilling theme would resurface in Saskatoon a decade later.

To their credit, soon after the skeletal remains were found near
Moon Lake, the Mounties identified their suspect, found a willing ex-con to
help set up his former friend, arrested Crawford and provided an air-tight case
that resulted in Crawford’s conviction on three murder counts. He’s currently
serving three concurrent life sentences and will be eligible for parole in
about five years.

But it was the tactics the cops employed along the way that still
disturb me when I think about this case or am asked to speak about it to the
media or in university lecture halls.

The Taysup, Napope and Waterhen families all hit roadblocks when
they reported their girls missing. All of the usual stereotypes kicked in when
family members sought the help of police in locating the missing women.

They were assumed to be partying, shacked up in Alberta or hiding
from police; those were the usual responses … if police or civilians working in
the various police stations even agreed to discuss the families’ concerns.

But there were other troubling aspects of the case. Completely
inexplicable tactics that, in my opinion, reek of racism and brutality.

When I spoke to a fourth year law class at Simon Fraser University,
I told the students about the Theresa Kematch incident. Some were shocked, one
or two doubted that my version could be true.

Theresa had the misfortune to encounter the predatory John Crawford
one drunken evening in Saskatoon. She was stumbling along Avenue P when
Crawford, well known by police as a convicted killer and now a suspect in a
triple murder, pulled his Cougar up to her near 11

^th

Street and
convinced her to get into the car.

The cops were watching all this unfold.

The Mounties had placed Crawford under surveillance and this was early
in the operation.

Intrigued, several officers got closer and observed as Crawford took
the vulnerable young woman to a storage lot, full of culverts, septic tanks and
other concrete products. He beat her, raped her and threw her out of the car.

All this happened in full view of the cops who chose not to
intervene.

A few minutes later, Theresa was arrested. She was held in the RCMP
cells overnight and released in the morning.

Crawford went home after the attack, and, as we would learn later at
the preliminary hearing, continued his pattern of attacks on Aboriginal women.

You can’t make this stuff up.

A few weeks later, with the RCMP surveillance team now bolstered by
the cooperative agent who would agree to wear a wire and help set up Crawford,
the violent sex maniac and killer got another opportunity that defies logic.

Crawford and his buddy, Bill Corrigan, picked up a woman and took
her to what was then the Imperial 400 motel on Idylwyld Drive. The police
officers watched and listened as Crawford had sex with the young, Aboriginal sex
trade worker in a locked room at back of the motel.

That the police allowed this to happen after listening to hours of
conversation between Crawford and Corrigan during which the killer described
how he had killed Eva Taysup, Shelley Napope and Calinda Waterhen is unnerving.
What were they thinking?

Could they possibly have got into the room in time to save the woman
if an enraged Crawford had attacked her as he had with Shelley, Eva and
Calinda?

Not very likely.

Why didn’t they care? Why were they prepared to take a chance like
that? Would they have taken the same risks if Theresa and the woman at the
Imperial 400 had been attractive, blonde white women?

I submit they would not have allowed such outrageous crimes to
occur.

The John Martin Crawford case was not particularly unique in terms
of public response or media attention. There simply wasn’t much interest on the
part of mainstream media or society in those days.

It certainly wasn’t a Paul Bernardo moment … but, then again, his
victims were pretty, white girls.

In the years that followed, there would be hundreds of crimes
against Indigenous women and girls reported. Families continued to tell
heartbreaking stories of loss and injustice.

We began to learn more about the Highway of Tears in British
Columbia and the Willie Pickton case in Vancouver. Horror stories emerged from
Winnipeg and Edmonton.

I’m often asked if anything has changed in the 15 years since Just
Another Indian was published.

I offer a firm, “yes and no.”

What hasn’t changed is that Indigenous women and girls are going
missing and being murdered in alarming numbers.

What has improved is that we are now talking about it and preparing
to do something about this troubling issue.

Gradually, previously muted voices began to be heard.

Questions were being asked. Organizations like the Native Women’s
Association of Canada began to demand action. There were calls for an inquiry. The
callous Harper government balked, despite overwhelming evidence of what was
clearly a national shame.

It came as a great relief that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s
Liberal government

announced earlier this month that it has established a
commission that will investigate the

issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women and girls

.

The

commissioners

have a daunting task before them. But it is an impressive panel and we have
every reason to believe they will do a fine job.