LOOKING FOR ANSWERS
A decade after Chelsey Gunn lost her brother, Anthony, to homicide, she continues to hold out hope that police will catch his killer. His case is among the files of unsolved deaths in the city that stretch back to the 1960s. Thia James reports in Weekend.
Chelsey Gunn was eight months pregnant when she woke up at 2 a.m. on a late August morning with a feeling of dread — an instinct, she calls it — gnawing at her about her younger brother.
Anthony Gunn should not have been in Saskatoon that night. He was supposed to be out of town for work, painting at a construction project. But he and Chelsey were preparing to move in together and she had needed help with the cable hookup, so he’d returned home a day early and was staying with their mother.
Chelsey called their mother’s house to check on him, but no one answered.
She tried calling again and again. Eventually, her teen brother answered and said Tony, as he was known to the family, was lying in a pool of blood, moaning.
Chelsey gathered her children and walked over to the home in the 600 block of Avenue M South. Yellow police tape surrounded it.
“That’s when I knew, then and there, he was gone,” she said.
Anthony was 23. His Aug. 26 death was recorded as Saskatoon’s seventh homicide of 2010. No one has been charged.
At some point in the ensuing years, the police investigation into Anthony’s death went from being just an “unsolved” case to a “historic” one, joining more than 20 historic homicides or suspicious missing person’s cases in the caseload of the Saskatoon Police Service’s historical cases section.
Though time has passed, police say these cases are not “cold” — it is still possible for new evidence to emerge and new witnesses to come forward. The cases can still be cracked, even with the passage of months, years or decades.
Chelsey continues to hope that charges will be laid in her brother’s case.
Anthony and Chelsey were born a year apart in Meadow Lake and were in and out of foster care during their childhood before aging out of the child welfare system.
In the weeks before his death, Anthony was heartbroken over the end of a long-term relationship and hadn’t been in a good place, she said.
The young father began to spend time with new friends, some of whom were associated with a gang lifestyle. Chelsey said she doesn’t think Anthony had become a gang member himself; she thinks he was starting to realize he was hanging out with the wrong people and needed to make a change.
“He was a good person,” she said. “He was funny. He just ended up in the wrong crowd.”
Chelsey said police communicated with her family for four to five months after Anthony died, but she hasn’t heard from police
He was a good person. He was funny. He just ended up in the wrong crowd.
CHELSEY GUNN
much in the last nine years. She expressed resignation that she won’t get any updates from police until the case is solved.
What she has heard is speculation, finger-pointing and stories others have told her — tales of jealousy, setups and planned attacks on her brother, she said.
“I wish I could know the real story. What really happened?”
CITY’S OLDEST HISTORIC CASE DATES BACK TO 1960S
There’s no real “line in the sand” that determines when homicide cases are classified as historic, says Saskatoon police Sgt. Tyson
Lavallee.
In the past, homicide investigators worked on historic cases when they had time. But with rising homicide and violent crime rates, along with more work going into investigating each new homicide, the city police force saw the need for a dedicated historical case section to work on those files. That unit was launched more than a decade ago.
Lavallee, the lone historic case investigator, spends his time poking away at historic cases; he also takes on unsolved cases when their lead investigators retire or leave.
His job is important because investigators can no longer work on historic cases off the sides of their desks, he said.
“The most challenging aspect of the job is knowing that you have investigations that can be solved, that there’s viable suspects, and it’s just a matter of resources and time and being able to put resources to investigations.”
One of the reasons cases are taking longer to investigate is the increased use of technology by investigators. Cellphones, cellphone camera storage, home surveillance videos and computer hard drives can yield evidence — but all that data ends up on police hard drives.
Lavallee said there has been a swell of such evidence obtained, processed and stored in the last decade — which takes time and resources.
Historic cases differ from cold cases because police believe they can still be solved. In a cold case, there’s no forensic evidence or information to move forward with, and all witnesses and investigative avenues have been explored.
Cases can be labelled as historic for decades.
The oldest historic case still being investigated by city police is the May 1962 homicide of Alexandra Wiwcharuk, a nurse who was last seen by roommates when she told them she was going to mail a letter before heading to work. A child found her body near the riverbank days later. She had been beaten, raped and buried in a shallow grave.
“The majority of our files, there are investigative avenues that exist or we continue to get information,” Lavallee said.
“Even something as old as the Wiwcharuk investigation, we still receive information every year and these are investigative leads that have to be explored.”
As the months and years go on, much of the interaction police have with families occurs when the families reach out to police as opposed to police reaching out to families, Lavallee said.
As cases become older, that communication tends to happen with more and more distant relatives.
LACK OF UPDATES FRUSTRATES FAMILIES
Freda Sutherland has waited nearly 18 years for the homicide of her daughter, 20-year-old Donna Kasyon, to be solved. She wants to grieve.
Sutherland, a Dene woman, can still remember the last time she saw her daughter on the night of June 14, 2002.
She thought Kasyon had been home all evening after coming home from babysitting. But, unbeknownst to her, Kasyon went for a walk around 10:30 p.m.
Sutherland remembers the sound of the back door to her house opening and closing, opening and closing. Thinking Kasyon was still home, she yelled out to her daughter to close the door, but she kept hearing it open and shut.
At 5:30 a.m. the next day, police called to tell her Kasyon had been killed.
She had assumed her daughter was home all night, she said.
“She just wanted to go for a walk that night and never returned home.”
Kasyon had been stabbed in the chest and was found wounded at the bus mall near Confederation Mall on Laurier Drive.
Bus driver Leonardo Rodriguez said he found Kasyon laying on the sidewalk at the bus terminal around midnight and called 911. He parked his bus and went over to her.
“She was kind of crying and hurting,” he recalled.
He stayed with her during her final moments.
“She was a tiny lady, very tiny. But even though she was in pain, a lot of pain, when I came to her, when I was talking to her, she tried to pull her blouse to cover herself,” he said.
“There’s a lot of details the police have of that night. I probably tried to remember everything I said to them, but what I remember, she was very humble at that point, very very humble.”
Rodriguez said Kasyon asked him to tell her mother she loved her.
He did that a few years ago, when he finally met Sutherland.
No one has been charged in connection with Kasyon’s death.
Not having the answers to who did this and why they did it has delayed her grieving, Sutherland said.
The last time she heard from police about the investigation was about two or three years ago, she said. At that time, there was talk of a possible suspect being identified, but nothing came of it.
“Eighteen years and no word. Police don’t get back to you ... you’re not hearing anything. I just feel like nothing’s getting done,” Sutherland said.
“As an Indigenous woman I believe police may be investigating, but not seriously trying to solve the cold cases or follow any leads. I never get updates.”
Darlene Okemaysim-sicotte, who works with families through Iskwewuk E-wichiwitochik (Women Walking Together), says it’s not uncommon for families of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls to have difficulty getting information from police. For example, sometimes family members of victims of crime are left off contact lists, she said.
Over the years, she has heard from families who say the file numbers of missing person reports are associated with the person filing the report, not the victim, which makes it more difficult for other family members to ask police for updates unless the file number is passed on, Okemaysim-sicotte said.
Saskatoon police spokeswoman Alyson Edwards said police encourage family members to let the investigator or their victim services liaison know about specific concerns they have so they can be looked into further.
“Our investigators work diligently on not only solving these cases, but on maintaining contact with family members. We utilize members of our Victim’s Services Unit as well, in hopes of maintaining strong relationships throughout the course of the investigation,” she wrote in an emailed statement.
INVESTIGATORS ‘WORKING BOTH ENDS OF PUZZLE’
Time can be on investigators’ sides, or it can work against them.
It brings new technological and scientific advancements and, with time, people may come forward with new information.
But time can degrade evidence — for example, VHS tapes and DNA on clothing — and witnesses and potential suspects can die.
Lavallee said investigating the oldest historic cases is a high priority because witnesses may soon not be around anymore.
But more recent cases also need to be in focus because the evidence is fresher and new forensic technology might be most useful.
“So it’s like you’re working both ends of the puzzle and trying to find a happy medium in there in terms of time,” he said.
Chelsey Gunn said she hopes someone comes forward with information about the night Anthony died.
If police can solve the case, it would ease her family’s pain and give them peace, she said.
One of the last memories she has of Anthony was of giving him a hug.
She never knew it would be their last.
“It always seems like it’s like that,” she said.
Her birthday is always difficult because it falls a couple days after the anniversary of Anthony’s death.
Her teen brother, who found Anthony, has since been imprisoned and their mother became addicted to methamphetamine after Anthony died, she said.
“I know I lost my mom, that’s for sure,” she adds.
My mom, I wish she’d get clean and just be the mom she was ... when my brother was alive. She’s not the same and she doesn’t have faith in the system.”
I believe police may be investigating, but not seriously trying to solve the cold cases or follow any leads. I never get updates.