Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2019

SKS S5 E3 "HELEN BETTY OSBORNE" ATW: The following program contains mature subject matter. Listener discretion is advised.

ATW: You are listening to Someone Knows Something from CBC Podcasts. In Season 5, David Ridgen travels north to Thompson, Manitoba, to investigate the 1986 murder of Kerrie Brown.

[Sound: The noises of a car]DR: Just drove several kilometres out of The Pas...down some gravel roads, unmarked site until you come upon it. There's nobody else around. It's the end of the day. Cloudy. There's no markers at all that would indicate that this is the way to the memorial for Helen Betty Osborne. You look it up online, there's GPS coordinates. I'm here where the memorial was laid, and I'm just walking up to it here. It's a concrete structure in Clearwater Lake Provincial Park here in northern Manitoba. Here we are. It's a bronze plaque embedded in the rock. There's some pennies around it, and some sweet grass at the top. And there's a picture of Betty. Helen Betty Osborne. July 16th 1952 to November 13th 19. This plaque is in memory of Helen Betty Osborne, who died at the young age of 19. Betty attended school here at Guy Hill Residential School in 1969 prior to attending Margaret Barbour Collegiate Institute in The Pas, Manitoba. And over here there's another rock, and on the rock it says Guy Hill Indian Residential School. 1958 to 1979. This is the site of one of the notorious residential schools that the Canadian government forced Aboriginal peoples into. So Helen Betty was killed in November of 1971, and the first arrest in Helen's case came in October 1986 — just before Kerrie Ann Brown was killed in Thompson. And the second arrest in Helen Betty Osborne's came the same month after Kerrie was killed. It's coincidental. Ok. See you, Helen.[Sound: DR walking away from memorial]

DR: Trevor's referring to the Conspiracy of Silence TV series made by CBC in 1991 about the murder of Helen Betty Osborne. TB: That murder scene still bothers me… out there...in the woods. I watched the movie this past year, and it .... it really bothered me that scene of him killing her. Clearly, it's ... it takes me to Kerrie in some way, shape or form. And perhaps what she went through.DR: Yeah, the memorial is pretty lonely place out there, and uh... I just think...it's important to remind people about...Helen Betty. And I think it's important when we're thinking about your sister's case... cause silence can be broken, right? People can know who did it and still not talk, but then eventually, you can break the silence, right? And you can get the truth.TB: So you can just imagine the average citizen who isn't involved directly but has second-hand information, perhaps even first-hand information on who did it. And just the only reason they don't come forward I know for a fact why those who do know have never come forward is fear. At the end of the day. That's it. There is no other way around it. It's fear.DR: Yeah.TB: Whatever the fear is. Who knows what kind of fear it is, but it's fear. And that's it. And you have to be willing to walk through that. And until you are willing to walk through that, nothing changes I don't think.DR: YOu know it was so many years later too. I think it was… [TB tries to like 15 years later you know that justice started to happened in that case.TB Yeah, and what's shameful about that case in The Pas was how many didn't want to get involved….

DR: I’ve already met with Robert "Bob" Urbanoski about his work on Kerrie Brown’s case in the 1990s. Urbanoski was an RCMP officer based out of Thompson in the early 1980s, and his main claim to fame is actually his work on Helen Betty Osborne's murder. Urbanoski’s largely credited for reviving Helen's case and getting it into the courtroom.

TB: Hey Dave. Can we go to my place so I can change?DR: Yup

DR: I want to hear from Urbanoski himself, his version of the story about how and why he went about re-investigating Helen's murder. Maybe that, along with his familiarity with Kerrie's case, can help Trevor and Jim and I in our own quest. But first, Norway House...and the people who knew Helen Betty Osborne best.

[Sound: A car in motion]DR: Okay. So arrived at the ferry for Norway House...it's the CF James Norway House cable ferry. Apetagon Norway House cable ferry. Daily service 24 hours. Departures every 15 minutes. So the ferry sort of pulls itself along a cable.

DR: This is my first visit to Norway House Cree Nation, where Helen Betty Osborne was born and raised. The small car ferry I'm on is crossing the Nelson River, which flows out of Lake Winnipeg. Norway House is on the Eastern bank of the Nelson further up the road and about three and a half hours drive from Thompson. God's Lake Narrows. 260. Gods River. 310. Oxford House. 206. I didn't know you could drive to Gods Lake Narrows. Maybe it's an ice road. Wow. Yeah, it's beautiful here.

[Sound: A door closes and footsteps echo]DR: Hi. Is this the band office?RECEPTIONIST: Yes, it is.

(crosstalk)

DR: Okay. Good. I’m looking for Darlene Osborne. RECEPTIONIST #3: You're from CBC? DR: Yes.RECEPTIONIST #3: Okay. Just a ... just have a seat. Darlene is on her way.DR: Oh, okay. Great.RECEPTIONIST #3: So did you drive in?DR: Yeah. Yeah, last night.

(crosstalk)

DR: Hello.DARLENE OSBORNE: Oh hi there, Dave.DR: Nice to meet you.

DO: Nice to meet you.

DR: Darlene Osborne is a band councillor and a major force behind a 2004 Amnesty International report, called Stolen Sisters, looking into missing and murdered Indigenous women.Her husband, John, was Helen Betty Osborne's first cousin. Councillor Osborne arrives with a friend named Marion. DR: Hello.

DO: Darlene and this is Marion Sysonis. That's .... [Marion: my cousin] .. Helen .... Helen Betty's cousin.DR: Ah! Okay. Thank you for coming.

MARION SYSONIS: Yeah.DR: Both women are 64. Darlene is taller with shoulder length dark hair and glasses wearing a blue blouse with a dream catcher embroidered on the shoulder. And Marion shorter and older seeming also in glasses with shorter wavy dark hair wearing a green raincoat over a light blue jacket.

MS: I'm not quite awake yet. [laugh]

DO: Let's go see our office.

MS: I think it'll be warmer in there. Oh, is it ever nice in here.

DR: We move into Darlene's office. I'm struck immediately by a wall-size quilt half yellow, half blue with a giant turtle in the middle circled by a braid of sweetgrass with five feathers along the bottom. Around the quilt, the photos of 16 young women, all of them missing or murdered from Northern Manitoba and four of them from Norway House. Helen Betty Osborne's photo is prominent near the centre. At the top written in giant yellow letters "Never Forgotten". At the centre in red, "Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women."

DO: These are our four girls from Norway House. This is Helen here. Helen Betty. This is my granddaughter here. And this is Hilary. Another one from Norway House. And Claudette Osborne. Still considered as missing. And these are the other ones from all over Manitoba. These are just a few pictures that we could get.DR: Never forgotten. That's good. Seems like a lot of missing women and murdered women in Manitoba. Helen Betty's up there.

DO: Yeah.DR: And you've got ...

DO: Felicia Solomon Osborne.DR: And you've got Claudette.

DO: The list of Missing and Murdered Indigenous women in Canada is long and sickening. Felicia Osborne age 16 disappeared in March 2003 from Winnipeg. Her remains were pulled from the Red River a few months later. Hilary Wilson, 18 was last seen alive in the North end of Winnipeg on Aug. 19, 2009. Her body was found in a field the next day. Claudette Osborne disappeared in Winnipeg at the age of 21 in July 2008. She has never been found.

DR: Three Osborne's up there. So it’s a...must be a big family name in Norway House?DO: It is. And they're all related.

DO: I knew Helen Betty when I was young. So after that when...Helen Betty was .....discovered. It took them many years to find out who the killers were or who the killer was. And I remember that time when Mrs. Osborne and other people went...think it was in Vancouver. When they went and met one of the .... one of the men that did this to Helen Betty. Dwayne Johnson. I think it was Dwayne Johnson. They met him one-on-one, and he did apologize to her and the family. Of course, Mrs. Osborne, you know, was a very kind woman, and she accepted the apology. And if you knew Mrs. Osborne, you know, she was .... she suffered silently...because what happened to her daughter that nothing came out of it. And those other...men that were in a car with Dwayne Johnson, I think they got away. They got away. It was just Dwayne Johnson that served.

DR: And you went there.

DR: So what was residential school like in The Pas for you? MS: Ah. [small chuckle] [small laugh]

DR: Guy Hill was open from 1958 to 1979, and during that time was run by Catholic Oblate Missionaries. The Cree language was banned at the school and brutal corporal punishments and sexual abuses of the Indigenous students at the hands of faculty there were common.MS: I remember we ran away from there, me and Betty and a whole bunch of us. We ran away and ... I don't know where we were trying to go, but I remember we were all sitting in a campfire at night sitting on a bunch of branches. We were trying to warm up, and we can hear these wolves, and we started running .... [laughing] ... and we started running back.DR: Back to school. [laugh]

DR: I guess what's worse, the wolves or the school.MS: Twice we run away. And one time it wasn't far from that there used to be cabins there, eh? By Clearwater Lake. And then we run away, and we started getting hungry, so we looked in the cupboards. All we found was straight macaroni, and we started eating it. [laugh] We started eating those. But oh, did we ever get a strap after when we got back. You know, a strap made out of metal in the middle. That's what we got.DR: And they hit you where?MS: On our hands like that.DR; On the hands.MS: Yeah. My hands were swollen for I don't know how many days.DR: And it was always you and Helen that ran away?MS: No. It was about four or five of us. [laugh] Yeah, it was hard being ... and a lot of stuff I don't want to remember. I don't want to talk about. But we had our good times and bad times with Helen, you know.

MS: Those guys that were involved in that murder. I think it was Dwayne Johnston ... used to sit in front of us in the classroom. But they were real prejudiced, um hmm. I think it's Dwayne or one of those other guys. They used to be in the same classes as us....DR: At that school?

DR: The feeling in Darlene’s office is one of tension mixed with emotional release. The experiences are raw and horrifying. The murder, cold, heartless, and brutal. Here’s the findings verbatim of the Aboriginal Inquiry for what happened to Helen Betty Osborne on the night of November 13, 1971. The description is graphic. "While walking along Third Street in The Pas on that cold Saturday morning, Betty Osborne was accosted by four men in a car. [Paul] Houghton, who was driving, stopped the car and [Dwayne] Johnston got out, attempting to convince Osborne to go with them to "party." She told them that she did not wish to accompany them. She then was forced into their car and driven away. In the car, Osborne was assaulted by Colgan and Johnston as Houghton drove. Johnston ripped at her blouse and [Lee] Colgan grabbed at her breasts. In spite of her screams and attempts to escape, Osborne was taken to a cabin belonging to Houghton's parents at Clearwater Lake. At the cabin, she was pulled from the car and beaten by Johnston, while the others stood watching and drinking wine they had stolen earlier. Osborne continued to struggle and scream and, because her assailants were afraid they might be heard, she was forced back into the car and driven further from town to a pump house next to the lake. At least some of her clothing was removed by her assailants in the car. At the pump house, she was once more taken from the car by one or more of her assailants, and the beating continued. Her clothes, those which had not been removed earlier, were taken from her. Wearing only her winter boots, she was viciously beaten, and stabbed, apparently with a screwdriver, more than 50 times. Her face was smashed beyond recognition. The evidence suggests that two people then dragged her body into the bush. Her clothes were hidden. The four men then left, returned to The Pas and went their separate ways. Her body was discovered the next morning, and the RCMP commenced its investigation."

DR: I’m back with former RCMP investigator Bob Urbanoski, at his home in Ontario.

BU: I came across the Helen Betty Osborne case is that my partner at the time actually had possession of the file, and was the investigator...from the GIS section. And over coffee and many discussions told me about this case, and I became just so interested in it. And I looked at this, and I thought 'this is an incredible case.'...Why can't we get it ...why can't we get it to the point where we can lay charges?

BU: And in there it stated that… they'd been at a party, and they'd been speaking with one of the individuals who identified himself as one of the four, and that he was distraught and he was talking about his involvement and other people's involvement. And the letter clearly gave the investigators at the time the information that they needed as to who. And that was .... that was sort of the breaking point. That was .... that was the beginning of being able to piece together bits of evidence. But that was anonymous. You know, there was no person standing behind that letter that said 'I had a confession, and I can give this information as evidence in court.' So there was a lot of that, you know. A lot of rumours around the town. But nobody that was coming forward that actually had firsthand.

DR: Other than an anonymous person coming forward and having first-hand evidence of...a confession of sorts by one of the perpetrators.BU: That's right. And that was...one of the things that...I wanted to do. Was to try and figure out who that was because that person had key evidence that could put this over the top. That was the starting point. If we can find one, we can find another. DR: So anonymous tips work. BU: Well, I mean it broke the case...for the investigators of the time. Nobody was coming forward, you know. How many people knew, we don't know? But clearly over the years ...since that time, a lot more people began...to I guess get firsthand knowledge through discussions over a beer or something where somebody would say something and that type of thing. But that was really the breaking point, and that person was key.DR: This would been 1971-72 then….BU: Correct.

DR: So we're into spring of '72 the letter comes.BU: I think it was about June or so.DR: Okay. The perpetrators hadn't had priors like that before? BU: There was nothing that indicated previous convictions or anything of that sort, you know. I mean this appeared to be, you know, for all intensive purposes a first time event, you know, for... for all of them. The autopsy revealed that there was .... there was no indication of a sexual assault. But when you look at, you know, the way the, you know, the way she was found with no clothing just boots. Clearly, that was the intent. But even then in the 70s they were trying to profile it. Trying to figure who would commit this kind of murder? The viciousness that was involved in it. And they came up with certain characteristics that they thought that might be involved….They canvassed every mental hospital in the province trying to figure out who's been recently released...because they thought clearly...the person who did this was .... was unbalanced...Because they looked at it and they ... they themselves saw this as a brutal murder.

DR: The inquiry found that, "there was, generally, an atmosphere of prejudice and bigotry against Aboriginal people prevailing in The Pas at the time of the murder, one which formed a backdrop to all social relations and interaction between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people." However, the Inquiry also found that, "After hearing all the testimony and reviewing the evidence, we have concluded that racism played a significant role in this case, but it did not cause any delay in the investigation of the killing or in the prosecution of those responsible." Bob Urbanoski.

BU: The letter writer. Why be anonymous? She was scared to death. She told the story to her brother. And her brother said 'well, let's write a letter, let's sent it anonymously, and let's send it right now.' Well, right now happened to be as they're driving through Marquette, Michigan. Everybody had thought, or people looked, and said 'well why would .... why would this letter come from Marquette, Michigan? If you look at Marquette, Michigan, and if you're driving from Winnipeg or driving from The Pas. Driving from Winnipeg going to Toronto, you got two ways to get there…And that's really what it was...they were going to Toronto. They were...Canadians. And they wrote the letter. But she was afraid. And she stated that in the letter. So is there a conspiracy for her. No. There's no conspiracy. She's scared to death. She was a young girl. A very young girl at the time. Come up to The Pas working for the summer, had come back to The Pas to visit, attended a party, and lo and behold, this information was laid out before her. And as the letter states, she was threatened. So what do you do? If you step forward being a young girl in that environment this person's already been murdered. Betty Osbourne's been murdered. What do you do? You go underground. You hope that maybe somebody else would know. And eventually .... her conscience, she told her brother and they said 'listen, this is what we can do. We can help.' And they wrote the letter.DR: Is there someone out there now who could write an anonymous letter to help solve Kerrie Brown’s murder? BU: It paid off and that person came forward. And that person was one of the keys to us being able to take the case forward, as were others.

DR: So talk about your strategy then to pull these people into you? What did you do?BU: The strategy clearly was to get people talking. Okay. To get it back out there. It died off over the years, and discussion about it was...it may have been mentioned from time to time, but it wasn't real chatter...And there was no new information. Nobody new was coming in and saying 'Oh, I heard this' or there are no rumours going around town. And I wanted ...to generate that. I wanted to get that chatter going again. But I wanted to go from the perspective of I'm not looking for somebody who has something that can give me evidence in court. Because I mean that's...that's the ultimate goal. But... when I spoke to the media in The Pas, and we released the news release I said 'we're looking for any information. Any information that you might know that you may have not have heard directly. But even information of somebody who might know.' Alright. So you might know somebody down the street that had mentioned it before. I want that name. Just give me the name of somebody who might know.

BU: There's always potential for a weak link. There's always potential for somebody having some, you know, some conscience. You know, having .... having some ... I guess, you know, looking at it and going, you know, I did something wrong, and I'm going to live with it for the rest of my life. And I think that's probably a good example of that as Betty Osborne and so. You had some people that were very strong and had one individual is very weak. And it bothered him, and he drank, and he told the story. And we capitalized on that. The anonymous letter writer capitalized on that. So, you know, the more people involved the better chance you have. But only if there's, you know if somebody has a change of heart or has a conscience. You know, that says... I've got to say something, you know, or it bothers me to the point where I have to talk about it to somebody. And if they do, then there's hope that those people come forward. But you don't know who the people are. You don't know their personalities. You don't know what happened to them afterwards. You don't know if there's one personality in that whole bunch that says you do not say anything, you know, or I'll come for you. I think when you look at the two different cases. Helen Betty Osborne we know who what where why how and when. Kerrie Anne Brown, we don't know who. But they've got a powerful weapon still in their arsenal, and that's that DNA. And that's not going away. You can't change that. No matter how much you deny at the end of the day, that's not going to change. From you know, from the day you left that to the day you die, that's going to be ... that'll be what's going to do you in. That's... that's their ace in the hole. And that's what they're going to exploit. That's what they've got to use as a leverage to try and figure out who done it.

DR: Back at Darlene’s office in Norway House, we’ve started to talk about the Osborne family, and the aftermath of Helen’s murder.

DO: And then when I remember...when Helen Betty got murdered after that the families became very dysfunctional. She separated from her husband, right?

MS: [agrees]

DO: And then, you know, the sons and daughters, they became very angry, and you know, a lot of those sons ended up in jail, you know. In and out of jail because they didn't know how to deal with their sister’s… death. Because there was no help for them at all. Nobody help them. Nobody paid any attention to them. Nobody cared. And it was just Mrs. Osborne that did her best...raising her kids, and being a single parent. You know, that must have been really hard for Mrs. Osborne. And she was so kind, and she was so forgiving….Can you imagine how she used to feel at the end of the day when it was time for her to rest? She always had Helen Betty on on her mind. Especially when there was nothing that happened. Justice ... it is hard.

DR: I think that's a good idea.DO: You know, when we were growing up I remember my late dad saying, you know, because they knew about Helen Betty… they were talking in Cree and they said 'oh, you know...don't worry.'... 'it will come out. Eventually it will come out."...And that's when people start healing…DR: Did anyone hear anything here about what might have happened?DO: Nobody ever said anything. Nobody ever talked about it.DR: Even in Norway House?DO: Yeah. Everybody was just quiet about it was like... she was forgotten. It's not that they didn't care. I think it was the fear. DR: Yeah.DO: The fear that and that brutal. The way we lost her. I think nobody wanted to talk about it today.

DR: How did you get on after your friend was murdered?MS: Actually, I got sent home. I started drinking heavy. And then one night we were sitting in the café. Me and my guidance counsellor. I use to go have a talk with her after that, eh? I couldn't concentrate on anything….and then we see these guys coming in. And they kept looking me and looking me...And then I heard one of those guys say 'I'm going to get that ... ' went like this to me. 'I'm going to get that dirty little Indian.' And then I realized I recognized one of those faces. It was one of those guys. And then ... so I talked to my guidance counsellor. I told her 'can you please send me home.' She said 'why Marion?' I said….'I can't do it anymore,' I told her...None of us... None of us came back for Betty's funeral. To this day, I never went back to The Pas. Right into The Pas. But I only went to that monument. Memorial. And that was it. Never went back. Brings too many memories AC.... bad memories I guess. Yeah. I turned to alcohol, and nobody would listen to us. It's like we were making up these stories.

DO: I used it and I was a fighter. [laugh] I learned to be a fighter. That's why we... we are still here. We’re 60-plus years old, and we're going to go on. [silence]MS: Yeah. [laugh]

DO: Yes!

DR; Well said. What she said! [laugh]

DO: Look across, look across there, you’ll see that brand new ferry.DR: Is the ferry ... is it always been 24 hours? Does it always just run?DO: Um. No. Way back in 1980s and 90s, it use to run only till 10 o'clock in the evening.DR: Ah, okay.DO: And now it's .... We're going to have a new ferry.

MS: A bigger one.DO: A bigger one.DR: How did it work then if people got here after 10. What would they do?DO: You know what, that happened to me a lot of times. I had to go back to Thompson because I got there late.DR: And you wouldn't just sleep at the other side or something?DO: Oh yes, we did. Oh yes, we did.MS: Afraid of Sasquatch. [laugh]DR: Tell me about Sasquatch...[laugh]DO: Well, you're ... you're in a territory where Sasquatch roams. DR: Really?DO: Yeah.DR: Have you seen them?DO: No. Not us. No. You know where the ferry crossing is?

DR: Yeah.DO: That's where they seen that Sasquatch.MS: And over here too. Further down up here. This is Papanogis Road. That's where they heard ... Heard and smelled them, eh?

TRANSCRIPT: Someone Knows Something - Season 5, EP 3

Social Sharing