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SKS S4 E3 “The Deer”

By David Ridgen

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[Crickets chirping and footsteps]

VOICE 1: On March 20^th…

VOICE 2: Run!

[Heavy breathing and running]

VOICE 1: ..only one movie experience this year will make you afraid to breathe.

VOICE 3: You won’t survive.

VOICE 2: We have to try.

VOICE 1: A Quiet Place: Part II. In theatres March 20^th. Tickets on sale now.

[Music]

ANNOUNCER: This is a CBC podcast.

[Dog barks and car doors shut]

[Creaky door opens]

DANIELLE: Hi! How are you?

RIDGEN: Oh, hi!

DANIELLE: I don't know if you remember me. Do you remember me?

ALFRUN: N-no...

DANIELLE: My name's Danielle... Greavette

ALFRUN: Get out! No you don't look anything like you used to! Oh my god!

DANIELLE: I haven't seen you in so long!

ALFRUN: In ages! Come on in!

DANIELLE: This is a friend of mine, David.

RIDGEN: Hi. I'm David, I'm from CBC.

ALFRUN: Oh, ok.

DANIELLE: He's actually from CBC and we're actually doing a little piece on my Dad.

ALFRUN: Oh, ok.

RIDGEN: Ed Galick’s partner Alfrun has opened the door and looks surprised. She appears to be in her late fifties, long light brown hair tied back, wire-rim glasses, and rubber sandals.

[Dog barking]

DANIELLE: I’m so afraid of your dog, I must say.

JUSTIN: Is Ed working?

ALFRUN: Actually, he's out cutting down trees, believe it or not, in the rain.

JUSTIN: Is he?

RIDGEN: Ed’s not here, but we’re invited inside to wait. Almost immediately, Alfrun begins a process of apology for she and Ed not going to Wayne’s funeral.

ALFRUN: Like, when the funeral-- we sort of wanted to go but then with all the shit that had happened it was like, “Well, jeez, maybe we shouldn't ‘cause, you know.”

RIDGEN: Alfrun says they didn’t go because people were pointing the finger at Ed.

ALFRUN: And then also we had heard stories in town that people were saying that Ed had had something to do with it.

RIDGEN: Alfrun takes us inside where Danielle, Justin and I eventually meet her husband Ed, Wayne’s old business partner. We talk for hours in a wide-ranging intense conversation that at times seemed friendly, but was filled with unseen tensions that Danielle described to me afterwards.

DANIELLE: The intention was to try and get as much information and keep him talking as long as possible. He described my father as a pig and we had to sit there straight-faced and laugh about it, but that's not what I was feeling inside at all. That's not what my brother was feeling inside at all. I just don't want this to look like we're--we're not concerned about those things because it does. It does, it cuts me to the bone.

[Theme music plays]

ANGELINE: You are listening to Someone Knows Something from CBC Original Podcasts. In Season 4, David Ridgen continues the work he started nine years ago on Wayne Greavette case. This is Episode 3: The Deer.

[Tractor pulling up and turning off]

ALFRUN: There he is down there, yeah.

[Dog barks]

JUSTIN: You look old!

ALFRUN: [Laughs]

ED: Hair’s not yellow.

JUSTIN: No, but it’s very white!

ED: Mine is!

[Laughter]

RIDGEN: Ed Galick Sr. is dressed in a white short-sleeve shirt with a collar and blue stripes on the sleeves. He says he’s 67 years old, but looks younger, and has medium length wavy gray hair, perfect looking teeth, light blue eyes, and a hearing aid.

ED: I'll have a coffee and Baileys.

ALFRUN: Yeah, I know I just put the kettle in.

RIDGEN: Ed moves deftly and speaks loudly, with an almost overwhelming confidence. A man used to being in charge of any situation.

ED: So explain everything why the hell-- I know you love me to death and you came to see me but it took you like a million years so... So what's that about? Explain it. Tell me a story.

RIDGEN: According to the Greavettes and the Galicks, their two families had been very close, and had worked together for a long time. But, despite this, they hadn’t spoken in the years leading up to Wayne’s death, or after. What was the nature of the disagreement between Wayne and Ed Galick?

DANIELLE: You know, what? I think we all got to talking about doing this because obviously it's been so long since dad passed away.

ED: Somebody-- somebody's out there that shouldn't be out there.

JUSTIN: What you said is exactly why.

RIDGEN: We’ve climbed some stairs back at Ed’s split-level home and are now gathered round a wooden dining table on a cold-tiled floor. The room’s painted a shade of mint green and above us on the wall, a large wooden cutout of a word: “family”.

DANIELLE: I mean, we started talking about it. To start at the beginning. There's only really you two. You guys knew us so well and you knew our family so well.

JUSTIN: We want to be able to sit down with you and get an understanding of what was my dad like? The good, the bad, the ugly.

ALFRUN: Oh no, there was a lot, of lot of good times.

ED: Oh, we had tons good times. I can't remember a lot-- I mean, they were all good times. Yeah, we just had our little marriage dispute come to the end at that.

JUSTIN: At the end, yeah.

ED: But, you know, yeah, to be truthful he did get screwed up a little at the end there anyway but that’s-- I still bring it up. I had him since he was 16 years old. All that's how many years? Like, I don't even know how old he was when he passed away.

JUSTIN: Yeah.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: But we worked our asses off. Like, we did what we did to get from my poverty line to his poverty line at that time.

JUSTIN: Like, how did you guys meet?

ED: He was working at 7-Up. I was a mechanic and I became the head. Put Wayne in charge, right? ‘Cause Wayne was a good worker. He was a really hard worker. Yeah, I spent about-- I mean, a good year disciplining him because he wasn't really into going to work and doing other stuff at the time.

JUSTIN: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

ED: But once he got that habit, he was the first there and the last to leave and the hardest working guy that you ever wanna meet.

RIDGEN: Wayne followed Ed from 7-Up to the Pop Shoppe, a soft drink company. Then, Wayne stayed on there while Ed left and started his own business. They kept in touch, and one day Wayne went to work for Ed again.

ED: Like, we'd been together for years now so we thought even alike. No, we got along great. Our brains are working together and all that. We were just working all the time, right? I said, “What we're gonna do is we're gonna go away for a couple of months, Wayne, and I'm gonna leave you in charge.”

RIDGEN: Ed would leave Wayne in charge of SERGE, and then go on vacation.

ED: It worked OK. We went away for a couple months. Came back and checked the books and everything and it was just great.

RIDGEN: But sometimes when Ed returned from vacation he says it wasn’t always rosy with Wayne. He recalls Wayne on one such occasion, had began treating workers harshly.

ED: He ruled people.

DANIELLE: Yeah? Did he start to feel--

ED: Yeah. I’d tell him, “You can't treat the people that were making us money like that”, right? ‘Cause that's what he'd do. He'd treat them like dirt, right? And I go, “Why would you do that? Where in the world would you get that? You were dirt. I was dirt. Like, we’re not--“ But I don't know where that came from. Right? We sorta straightened it out, like, you know, because I said, “I don't want people coming to me telling me about you and then leaving because you're too hard on them, right?”

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: So he caught on that pretty quick, ‘cause I said, “I'll get rid of you, man.” ‘Cause I don't need that headache.

DANIELLE: Was it more, like, employees or was it customers and employees?

ED: Employees.

JUSTIN: So he was losing the respect of his crew?

ALFRUN: Yeah.

ED: He just-- he went power nuts. He went power nuts for about a year. We got it put to bed, right, and that was ok. So then we decide we're going for six months. We’re like-- I was a little apprehensive about it I says, “Why don't you just move into the house?” This one, I guess you guys were living here, right, for about six months.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: And we’re just gonna be gone. And I’ll call you once in a while. That worked out OK. So he comes up with this bright idea of we're gonna put Diane in there, right? Alfrun and I worked together so he thought that would be the next natural step.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

RIDGEN: But, in Ed’s opinion, Diane wasn’t working out for the business.

ED: She's got her opinion, I got my opinion, and you got your opinion but fortunately or unfortunately I own the business and here's where we're going.

DANIELLE: Yep.

ED: You know, and I can't explain it any better. So that happened for about two, three months and then they rebelled on it, right? I'm just gonna tell you how our marriage split it up, right?

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: So I come back and I guess through all the jobs I've ever done part of your job is-- the worst part is saying you don't work here no more, right?

RIDGEN: Eventually, Ed says he asked Wayne to fire Diane.

ED: So I said, “I think you’re gonna let her go.” “So why don't you do that?” “’Cause I didn't hire her. You did.”

JUSTIN: So he fired her?

ED: Yep.

RIDGEN: I asked Diane for her version. She says Ed and Alfrun were the ones who fired her.

DIANE: I was let go and I don't know why I was let go. And they said that they didn't need my services anymore and whatever and I worked really hard and, you know, Wayne worked really, really hard. What Wayne had said to me was that the two of us between me doing that job and him doing that job Ed wasn't happy.

RIDGEN: Diane having to leave caused a lot of friction, and another factor that lead to Wayne and Ed’s final falling out was to do with a company she and Wayne had developed. SERGE had acquired a company called Conveyor's Unlimited and Diane says she and Wayne worked hard to manage the company while Ed was away in Arizona. She says it was Wayne’s understanding that he would own 50% of Conveyor's Unlimited, but when Ed returned, she says Wayne was only getting paid his usual 10%, as Ed considered Conveyers to be part of SERGE. So, Wayne and Diane planned to start their own company with Leesa that they would call D & L, and Wayne began the process of leaving SERGE himself.

ALFRUN: It just caused a lot of tension.

ED: I said, “Since we're not working out together, give me a number, adios amigos.” And so he goes, “OK, I want this and that” and I said, “No problem, you can have that.” And then spite came in really bad. I have him that's really not happy with me because he has to fire his missus and then he gets canned. Right? I understand the feelings.

RIDGEN: I’ve also heard Diane’s version of the situation.

DIANE: When Ed came back that year, Ed decided that he was gonna put that all together and basically pay Wayne his 10%. Well, Wayne was pissed off with that because he said, "That's not right. Like, I'm 50% of Conveyors Unlimited, 10% of SERGE beverage. That doesn’t-- you know, it’s not right. You can't just take that money and throw it in with that” and Ed said he could do anything he wanted to do.

RIDGEN: That disagreement ended in court, with Wayne seeking compensation for the value of his share of the business. In the end, in 1993, Ed and Wayne went to court-ordered mediation. Wayne owed Ed money for a previous loan and Ed owed Wayne money. In the end Wayne netted around $100,000, according to Diane. And then roughly three years passed without the families speaking a word to each other. Wayne used his money to help buy the farm. And then Wayne was murdered in December 1996.

ED: We sorta ended all that anyway like regular lawyer stuff and all that.

ALFRUN: We finally settled.

ED: But we never did get engaged to being friends again. So what happened took a third of my life right out of me because that was always there, like, and vice versa.

DANIELLE: Oh, for sure.

ED: Yeah, and like, we were always there.

ALFRUN: We counted on each other.

ED: How’s this? How’s that? How’s the kids? I pretty well lost him for two years after that. Like, I know it was a three year difference but the first year I sorta kept tabs because he was calling a lot of my customers. You know, he was trying to survive. So, on a business aspect, no effect whatsoever. Uh, personal, big effect, a big hole in your heart. Like, why, how did that happen? We used to have our domestics together but we were always number one.

RIDGEN: Here, Ed downplays his disputes which he calls “domestics” with Wayne, and moves to a story about them both getting into a scrap with someone else.

ED: He was a feisty little son of a gun. I don't know where he got his balls for his size. We were down in Newmarket having a beer. It was me, my brother Roy and we stand what size we stand, right? Got little Wayne with us, right? So this guy over here, he's just yipping away, right? He's just pushing somebody and they bumped into him and spilled our beer, right? Well, we paid for this and now we're upset, right? This guy didn't offer to pay for it so. Wayne gets up and grabs the guy by the hair-- just like that ‘bing, bing’ about four times and the guy was gone and I go to Roy like “Aren't we ashamed?” No, he wouldn’t take shit from nobody.. He didn't really walk away from anything, but he did walk away from responsibility in the last three, four years.

DANIELLE: Yeah, specifically what way do you think...?

ED: I know what he was doing but I-- I don't wanna say that.

JUSTIN: I'll be blunt here. Not knowing hurts us a hell of a lot more. I mean, even coming here was a little bit nervous because we know that there's gonna be things that we don’t want to hear but, you know what, we hear it in the press, in so many things...

DANIELLE: We heard a lot already.

ED: I know, but it's still your pa and the stuff you don't know is probably good ‘cause then your memories would stay the same and then if, you know, the other side... I might steal some of your memories.

DANIELLE: We're not trying to remember him as someone who died of natural causes. We're trying to remember and we're trying to figure out what might have happened to him.

ED: I lost that lousy two years-- like, I just didn't stay in contact to know who, where and how and I lost that so a lot of it became guessing but on the same part the what, who and how was still in the circle that we all lived in, right?

DANIELLE: Well that’s it.

ED: He left a lot of people wondering what the hell happened to him, right?

DANIELLE: He certainly did.

RIDGEN: And with Danielle and Justin pressing for more. Ed tells them something about their dad they have never heard before.

ED: Well, see he started moving in different directions. Like, we had a philosophy. We weren't no angels, right? It was kinda easy to rip people off and the job that we did, you were very capable people ‘cause there's a million people out there and you could just rip off that guy and rip off that guy. I never wanted that, right? I wanted us to have the biggest name, the best name and they're calling us because we're the most honest, hardest working son of a guns and, but we want our money and that's just the way it is.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: Near the end there, that's why I had to do something with him. Uh, he took a little money, right? I even told her and she would tell me "Why didn’t you kill him" or something like that, you know what I mean? I don't mean to use those words. You use that word all the time.

JUSTIN: Yep.

ED: Why wouldn’t you just tell me you were taking that and just take it in advance or take it as a bonus and just sell more or something like that? Why would you just go and take it and not even tell me? Like, I will find out.

DANIELLE: Yeah. When you approached him about that, like, what was his answer to that?

ED: Denial.

DANIELLE: He just denied it flat?

ED: Oh yeah. Yeah. It was like a lousy-- I think it was ten or fifteen thousand dollars but he was running into this hiding problem when he was still with SERGE and I've never done all that stuff. Right? I just smoked pot. I love pot cause you get so wired I had to come down and that's why I did a lot of pot and a lot of drinking. He ventured off to experiment with all this other stuff. It just affected his work terribly because he'd be late for work, which is super unusual.

JUSTIN: Yes.

ED: Like, that’s just totally-- he lived there. Like, you know, even if he was sick he was there.

RIDGEN: Ed says Wayne took ten or fifteen thousand dollars - something I cannot verify - but also says that Wayne denied it. And then Ed says he observed a new change in Wayne’s behaviour, a kind of paranoia, one Ed attributed to harder drug use, though Ed says he never actually saw that kind of use with his own eyes. Diane says that beyond pot, harder drugs may have only been used recreationally and then, very infrequently.

JUSTIN: So if he was into the coke scene, that's an assumption?

ED: It's an assumption and not an assumption all at the same time. It was just like night and day. Like, looking through my eyes, I mean, I just known this guy for 20, 30 years. I wouldn't give him the time of day and the guy's head was all over the goddamn place. Right? And there was no more reality. It was just like “Get out of here. Go hide. Don’t answer the phone. Never answer that phone.” Well, that's what we do. [Laughs] Without that phone, we got no business. It wasn't like today's world, right?

DANIELLE: Was it more of like a paranoia did you find, or was it more like he was just running around?

ED: I don’t know but don't people on coke hide away and all that?

RIDGEN: So, Ed’s story is that Wayne starts acting strangely, possibly stealing from him and not answering phones. Ed fires him and in the process of leaving, Wayne maybe tries to take SERGE customers for a new business of his own. Their disagreement over percentages is dragged into court where the suing happens. And Ed says he heard in the rumour mill of the beverage and packaging industry, that money may have played a part in Wayne’s death.

ED: Then I started hearing stories. Like, “Oh, you want me to do your conveyor, your job?” Yeah ok, give me like 50 bucks” or whatever the big number might've been, and not do that job...just keep the money. Yeah, and there you go and see as a business guy you gotta weigh the lawyers and the court against losing $5,000 or you're gonna sink $10,000 and going to chase $5,000? No! ‘Cause your time, you wanna build your business...swallow hard and never deal with that person again and anytime you can get him, you can get him and that's fine. And that's the way most-- if you start to rip off on the lower numbers, right? Now if you graduate to a higher number...ouch! Like, [Laughs] I don't know what's gonna happen. But then on the same tune, I could steal your earrings, and that could piss you off so much you might do me in. Just for a lousy set of earrings.

RIDGEN: If Wayne was taking money for jobs he didn’t do, could that be enough to enrage the wrong person into sending the package? Ed says he got word from some of Wayne’s customers who were unhappy.

ED: See, I'm gonna tell you, like, I do-- ‘cause the customers came back.

JUSTIN: Right.

ED: And they're going like “Ed, the guys' with you.” “No, no. He's not with me. He's got their own company.”

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: Like, he was just a salesman for me after a while because the more he screwed up, the more they'd come back.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

JUSTIN: But what about, like, the customers that called? Out of the people that he basically did quasi sales for you guys by shoddy business and sent it and come back to you but out of the people that you’ve heard complain what was some of the big numbers that you heard come out?

ED: I heard like a lot of fives and tens...

RIDGEN: I don’t know if what Ed says he heard about Wayne cheating customers in the business is true.

ED: Follow the money. Just eliminate all that shit. But that's a major one for me. This is truly speculation on my part, right?

RIDGEN: Ed goes on to say that Wayne became involved with people in the industry who were less than honest.

DANIELLE: He surrounded himself with people.

ED: Losers. [Laughing] A bunch of losers.

DANIELLE: Yeah, people who were crooks.

ED: Yeah, big time.

DANIELLE: And eventually that-- I mean, if I’m to gather what you're saying correctly, you know, you're kinda saying he surrounded himself with crooks, he turned into a crook. That's what you think went wrong there.

ED: I’d chase that.

DANIELLE: Yeah?

ED: I would chase that. Because, I don't know about killing people and all that. So he's either ripped a lot of people in the last two years just because of money.

DANIELLE: Mmm-hmm.

ED: Plus, I don't know what the habit would cost you. You know? [Laughing] Like, you gotta throw all that in there. See that's what starting to do, surround himself with these characters.

RIDGEN: And Ed mentions another case that is also of interest.

ED: I'll give you another for instance. I guess you're aware, like, Paul Henttonen? You know, Paul Henttonen? Oh, he's in the same business as this guy.

ALFRIN: Plastic belt?

ED: Plastic Belt.

RIDGEN: Paavo “Paul” Henttonen was another man in the packaging industry involved in a different partnership.

ED: And he got into the same business we're in and he went the wrong way. Like, he was doing weird things. Right? But that's the nature of the business. There's a whole bunch of it. If it's too good to be true it's not true, right? So you don't worry about it, but I did a lot of deals with the guy, and all that, played poker with him, good drinking friend, same thing, right? He got stabbed 14 times, got killed right in his own shop. They found him the next day.

[Crickets chirping and footsteps]

VOICE 1: On March 20^th…

VOICE 2: Run!

[Heavy breathing and running]

VOICE 1: ..only one movie experience this year will make you afraid to breathe.

VOICE 3: You won’t survive.

VOICE 2: We have to try.

VOICE 1: A Quiet Place: Part II. In theatres March 20^th. Tickets on sale now.

RIDGEN: On Friday May 17, 2002, just after 9:00 am, a cleaning lady found Paul Henttonen dead in his apartment on Rosetta Street in Georgetown. He had lived and worked there, the owner of a scrap metal and vending machine repair business. The 54-year-old man had been stabbed repeatedly with a kitchen knife. He was last seen when he was dropped off by a taxi just past midnight after spending an evening at The Barber Towne Pub, also in Georgetown. He was a father of three and was said to be well-liked. In reports on the case, Halton Regional Police have said that a large amount of money went missing around the time of the murder, although they don’t think robbery was a motive. They do think it was personal though and that Paul knew the person or people who killed him. The police developed several DNA profiles from the crime scene, and discovered blood from the person they believe is responsible, and they have a palm print from Paul’s green 1997 Chevy pickup that was found two days later a few kilometres from his home. To this day, no one has been charged with Henttonen’s murder.

ED: Everyone's going, “Holy shit, there goes Wayne, there goes another guy. I better retire. I probably the oldest guy in the business right now.”

DANIELLE: Did they ever find?

ED: They never found that guy either.

RIDGEN: Diane says Wayne knew Hentennon too and got along well with him. They bought parts from him and Diane thinks Hentennon and Wayne used to drink together. Police hadn’t connected Hentennon’s murder to Wayne’s when I spoke to them in 2009, and in 2017 the new case-holder gives the same impression. Danielle brings the focus back onto Ed Galick and her dad’s murder.

DANIELLE: Oftentimes, I think we thought, you know, that maybe there was a possibility that you might have done it.

ED: Like for six months, they're tapping my phone, the van's parked up there, I did four lie detector tests, I gave my hair to the forensic people to do DNA and the guy told us “How'd your DNA get to the house?” Right? At the farm. And I go, “I don't know how-- I know where the farm is, but--” [Laughing] “I just-- I don’t know. I never go over there but he did live at my house and that Wayne there he was a crook and a half. He'd be stealing my ball hats all the time.” [Laughs]. Well, he'd have a thing about “Oh, I like that ball hat” and then he'd be wearing and I didn't have a ball hat. Right? [Laughs] ‘Cause he was just-- it was just like friendly stuff, right? But I had nothing to... there was no reason to lie and I sort of told them truthfully, “Number one is it would take a 45 ft truck to build a bomb if I was building a bomb.” [Laughs] I have no idea how that even works, right?

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: I'm not that talented so I'd have to shoot him. I don't own a gun, but I'd have to shoot him. I’d go “Bang, bang”, right? Like, why would I go to destroy a company that's just starting? You know, like, “Oh, that-- and stuff, like, why would I bother? I'm already busy, right? And I'm not wasting my time. I don't have that time for the hate or the revenge.

RIDGEN: Ed says police didn’t come to talk to him right away.

ED: See the cops never came to see me for two to three weeks, right? Which is totally unusual ‘cause I'd be the first guy there. You know, like, if I was a cop I'd go see that guy. They just broke up, did their court, da, da, da. They were best friend, the family would say someone gone and screwed us over. Like any stories or whatever...the hateful and good things would come out.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: So I got-- I noticed cars parked. So this guy in this van here. So every morning I'm going to work, there's the van, right? Come back home and there's the van over there and I get over here and then the phone start clicking and the phone start clicking at work there right? And I go “Wow” and nobody's coming to see me. I got a wife, you know, and I’m starting to put all this, and I'm getting paranoid I guess, right? And then I'm thinking, “I wonder if that was, like, to SERGE or to Wayne?” I don't know the information yet, right? Alfrun, you go get the mail. I ain't touching it, right? [Laughs]

JUSTIN: Were you afraid for your life?

ED: I thought about it. But it took him so long. You know, like, you waited three weeks. Like everybody's phoning “Ed, I just got interviewed by the police” and da, da, da. And I go “Wow, they never come here.” Week later someone else has come “Yeah, they were down at our place interviewing” I was like “Why aren't they coming here?”

ALFRUN: They interviewed his sister.

ED: Everybody. But not me.

ALFRUN: Amazing the people they did--

ED: So I go, “Let me see... Best friend. Been in business forever…” I'd be the first person. I'd be going to that guy right away. So why you guys waiting three weeks? And here I am into this mess and we just got rid of the mess we were just in. Wasted a whole bunch of three years or two years in court - and now I'm back again - and all I wanna do is just forget it. The business is going down because people naturally everybody go “that guy”, “that guy.” Well, the more I say “It's not me”, the more it is that guy. He got away from this. “No, it’s not me.” Believe anything you wanna believe, man. I don't care. Like, why am I defending myself against what? What am I defending myself against?

RIDGEN: Finally, Ed says the police got in touch with him and asked whether he’d be willing to take a lie detector test.

ED: My lawyer goes, said, “Don't even do that lie detector test or nothing, eh?” I just drove right up there and slapped it on and I was only supposed to be there for half an hour. I was there for four hours. And they locked me up. They wouldn't even let me out of the room, right? And then I freaked out on them. Like either arrest me. And then your mind starts doing weird things, like, you know, like how can I get myself out of this? I didn't even get into this. How can I get myself out of something I didn't get myself into? Yeah, well, see, I think they forgot that we hurt too. Probably drinking more than you should. Because you're scared. You know, like, you're sitting there thinking “How am I gonna convince them that I had nothing to do with that? What can I say or do?” Like, “Come in the house. Just take everything out of the house. Take everything, everything and just satisfy yourself and go find the weird guy.” You're wasting too much time on me.

DANIELLE: Mmm-hmm.

ED: That's the way I looked at it. Don't waste your time. Go get that weird guy. Do I blame em? No, I don't blame them for that. As long as you're doing a good job and apparently they did because they didn't come back and do nothing to me.

RIDGEN: Police will not verify whether Ed undertook a lie detector or any other form of co-operation with their investigation.

ALFRUN: Nobody never-- never ever heard from them again after those few months and you're always curious, like, you know, have they found anything? Or, you know…

ED: But now you're scared to go check it out.

RIDGEN: After Wayne and Ed parted ways, Ed Galick put his son Ed Jr. into Wayne’s position at the company. Ed Jr. had worked at SERGE in various capacities over time and knew the Greavettes well, but Ed says that his son didn’t like Wayne.

ED: My son didn't like him ‘cause he thought “He's stealing my pa” and all that. Well get off your butt and do what he does and we're gonna be one right? It's that easy. I treated everybody the same.

JUSTIN: With all due respect with to Little Ed he had his tries.

ED: Yeah, exactly.

RIDGEN: Little Ed, Ed Jr. or “Eddie” as some call him, worked in the beverage and packaging industry too, but didn’t stay at SERGE for long.

ED: He only lasted a year and a half and I fired him. ‘Cause he got--

ALFRUN: That's a whole other story.

ED: It’s a whole other story. But he went to coke too.

RIDGEN: He went to coke, meaning, Ed Jr., according to Ed Sr., went to cocaine. Ed brings up his son Ed. Jr. again later when he’s asked who might be capable of making a flashlight into a bomb.

DANIELLE: OK, OK. Let’s switch it around differently. What is the profile of somebody you would think...Let's say if it was in the industry? What people in your industry, I guess, would have that knowledge?

ED: My son?

JUSTIN: Your son?

DANIELLE: You think?

JUSTIN: He knew electronics?

ED: He's smart.

DANIELLE: He's smart?

ED: Oh, he's smart. He could do anything. He could read a book in like 30 seconds.

JUSTIN: Was he really that pissed off with my old man?

ED: Oh no, no. I'm not saying my son would do that.

DANIELLE: Where did, like, what-- where would he get that sorta knowledge from?

ED: He's smart. He's a computer guy.

DANIELLE: Yeah, yeah .I guess computer guys... You know, I’m just trying to think…

ED: Can't you find all that stuff on a computer?

JUSTIN: Yeah, you guys didn't even have internet at SERGE.

ED: No.

ALFRUN: No.

DANIELLE: But I'm just wondering specifically what type of businesses that maybe SERGE did business with that would have that electrical or computer sort of experience? Maybe somebdy--

ED: Darling, we worked for everybody.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: From huge breweries to craft. I mean, like, there's a million people out there that would know that stuff. Like a lot of smart people, right? A lot of times we would get engage with engineers naturally if you're gonna bid on a job and all. Do they have enough brains to do that? Of course they do.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

ED: Yeah. So, what profile? I mean, you're talking to some sick dick, right? Like, what profiles? Yeah, like I don't know what profile it could be. It could be anybody.

RIDGEN: So do you think your son could've done this? Like are you saying that you think your son could have done it?

ED: No. I'm just saying it's just another person. No, that would be terrible. Like, I would have the capabilities or, like, you know, anybody. But no, he's just a factor in that whole web. If I knew he did, he'd be in the crowbar motel. I ain't that foolish as a parent. So I can't honestly tell you that I would suspect them or anything like that. I would've told the cops if I suspected them, right, but I didn't tell them that because I didn't.

ALFRUN: But he's just weird.

ED: But he is a weird dude

[Laughs]

ALFRUN: Like Eddie is very warped. There’s something wrong with that kid.

RIDGEN: So are you talking to your son now, like Ed?

ED: Uh, no. We're sort of like better off not doing that.

[Laughs]

ED: You know, there is no salvaging him anymore. Like, you know, he might give me “Oh, dad, I'm clean and stuff” and da, da, da. I plan on never seeing him. But I got great grandchildren. I got great great grandchildren from that. From whatever they did. So he did give me a good present that way...

RIDGEN: Ed Jr. is someone I’ll need to talk to.

JUSTIN: Your idea is that it's either been, you know, ripping customers off or he was moving stuff.

ED: As, you know, in this business... it's a pretty common thing. All the little shysters are doing that. Number one is I would-- I would love to hit the books.

ALFRUN: Stuff like that--

ED: Just trace all that. Like, the writing down has to be in those books.

JUSTIN: I'm assuming you told all this to the police.

ED: Oh no.

JUSTIN: No?

ED: No, no. Like, they were trying to develop I have a thing for Wayne. Right? And I'm like, “No”. Did I like it? No. Would I go out of my way to do anything about it? No. Why would I do that? I ain't got no time for that.

JUSTIN: To me, it's exciting to know this. Not because you didn't tell the police but because that means there's still ways to work on this and ‘cause I mean, for us, you kind of hit a place where you're like “Shit, is this a dead end?”

RIDGEN: Ed may not have had to suggest that the police take a look at the books, because the police did it anyway. In fact, police say they went through all the available records and found nothing.

ED: Whoever did it is a complete coward. Number one.

JUSTIN: Yes, I agree.

ED: And then the other part of it is the little message on the bottom. I'm trying to recall. I don't remember.

ALFRUN: Have a good day?

JUSTIN: “Have a very merry Christmas and may you never need to buy another flashlight.”

ED: There you go. How sad does that person gotta be knowing what the end result is?

[Music]

ED: So I got...we got reading that letter thing there, right? But the important factor was, they knew Joe and Leesa worked there. Okay?

JUSTIN: When did you get the names?

ED: It's on that letter. Just blacked out. These girls figured it all out. That's what it was.

JUSTIN: So it was just speculating those names.

ED: Yeah, yeah. I'm not sure.

JUSTIN: Well, it wasn't until just till recently that, uh, they came out released the names.

DANIELLE: Yeah...

RIDGEN: Originally, the letter was released to the public with the two names redacted as “hold back” - information that only the killer would know. Ed is saying that the women working in his office were able to figure out the names based on the context of the redactions.

ED: I even told the cops that when we were doing the lie detector. My crew figures that's Joe and Leesa and Lisa's spelled wrong. That's what he said, “How do you know that?” I said “I don't know that. My girls know that.”

ALFRIN: Spaces...knowing who worked there.

ED: Yeah. But then you get the guy who sends you the letter has privilege to that. Like, who in the world would even care, number one. How weird do you gotta be to wipe out a whole family? Who had nothing to do with your problem?

[Laughs]

RIDGEN: Danielle and Justin push Ed into telling them more stories about their father.

JUSTIN: But what was he like when the women weren't around? Like what was he like when you guys went out and...?

[Laughs]

JUSTIN: Well, we really do appreciate you guys for taking the time.

ED: I appreciate you all coming down and talking to us.

ALFRUN: You have a few minutes to go down and meet the deer?

DANIELLE: Yes, of course!

JUSTIN: Yeah, absolutely.

DANIELLE: Of course.

ED: That's the baby deer we had in the house. We were raising it.

ALFRUN: I told them all about it.

RIDGEN: After a conversation that weathered almost four hours, Danielle and Justin get up from the kitchen table. We walk outside, and down to the deer pen.

JUSTIN: Well, thank you very much.

ED: Thank you. It was a pleasure. It was a pleasure.

ALFRUN: Oh, I enjoyed seeing you guys. Keep in touch. Let us know how things go.

JUSTIN: I will do. Absolutely, and you guys got our numbers too.

ED: OK, Mr. CBC. [Laughing] You take care.

RIDGEN: Thanks a lot.

In the van, Justin and Danielle reflect and gather their thoughts on the man they once called Uncle Ed.

[Car driving]

JUSTIN: Just because Ed shared a lot with us and talked with us and gave us hugs and shook our hands, till that person's caught they will always, always be a person of interest to me.

DANIELLE: Well, I don't trust anybody either.

JUSTIN: You think dad took money?

DANIELLE: Most definitely.

JUSTIN: You think so?

DANIELLE: Yep.

[Music]

JUSTIN: I was going in not wanting to have to paint a bad picture of dad. What I'm realizing now is that I can't be naive to the point where I can think that he was a great man to everyone else outside of his family ‘cause by the sounds of it he wasn't. He was an amazing father and by the sounds of everything I'm learning, that is the extent of it. He was a good family man and then anything outside of his family-- it is turning into story after story of crap. How much of that is true? Well, I guess we'll have to find that out.

DANIELLE: Our intent was to go there with the sole purpose to try and keep the man talking, and I think we did that well but in the process I've walked away thinking that I betrayed him by just, you know, not sticking up for him. I don't believe he was as bad as Ed made him out to be. He lived and now he's dead and he can't defend himself against these accusations. Inside, I hate to think that he might've ripped somebody off and that caused his death or that he had he was abusing drugs and that might've caused his death. He may have got mixed up with people and he may have taken money from people. That's a given. I think it's very likely he did. And we have to come to terms with those facts but he wasn't a pig and he wasn't a thief as people might take that. If he got himself in trouble and that's what killed him, so be it. It doesn't mean that you package up an explosive and send it to someone's house and blow them up in front of their family. You know? You don't do that. [Tearfully] You don't have to do that. It's too severe for anything that he could've done. I'll be honest with you, this process is kind of overwhelming because I didn't really realize there were so many avenues that were gonna be opened up. I think that he did steal money from people. I don't know if I believe the drug theory. I think he was scared. He was scared for his life. He was paranoid, and I think that's why.

[Music]

RIDGEN: Did Wayne steal? Did he cheat? Did he owe money and if so, for what reason?

The meeting with Ed Galick so difficult for the Greavettes, answered some questions, but brought many more with it. And walking away from it, other people have come to light that I need to speak to. In particular, Ed’s son, Ed Jr. Eddy. Little Ed. Smart, capable, “weird” by his father’s definition, but a bomb-builder? Facebook tells me that Ed Jr. lives somewhere out in Western Canada. I reach out to him with a message.

“I am hoping you are the Ed Galick Jr. I am looking for. Apologies if you are not. I am creating a program for CBC about the case of Wayne Greavette. I am looking for people who knew Wayne who might be able to tell me more about him. If you can spare some time, I'd be grateful if we could chat a bit about him. Thanks for your time, David Ridgen.”

Ed Galick Jr.’s reply comes quickly, saying. “It's about time.”

ED JR: I honestly, when that happened, I was shocked. Should be interesting to find out what the hell happened there. I never ever wished their family or Wayne harm or anybody dead in my life.

[Theme music plays]

ANGELINE: You have been listening to Episode 3: The Deer. Visit cbc.ca/sks to learn more about the typewriter and daisy wheel used to compose the letter, and to find out how to submit a tip to the podcast. You can also join our listener community on Facebook and Twitter and be the first to hear about new content. Someone Knows Something is hosted, written and produced by David Ridgen. The series is also produced by Chris Oke, Steph Kampf, Amil Delic, Eunice Kim and Executive Producer Arif Noorani. Our theme song is “Higher” by Olenka Krakus.

[Singing]

Olenka Krakus: There’s a road in the distance that ends in a pit.

Where a-weeping was wimping and fire…

ANGELINE: Someone Knows Something is a proud part of CBC Original Podcasts. Another podcast we think you’ll like is Personal, a self-improvement show that helps you be your best you as best they can, given the constraints.

VOICE 1: My prediction is that I will be wholly unsuccessful, five out of five days.

VOICE 2: You just went stone cold.

[Laughter]

VOICE 2: You honestly think you could go 0 for 5?

VOICE 1: Yes.

ANGELINE: Subscribe in Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to SKS.

ANNOUNCER: For more original CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca/originalpodcasts.

TRANSCRIPT: Someone Knows Something - Season 4, EP 3

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