The Strange Death of Cindy James (Part 2) | Morbid | Podcast | Forensic Files

hey weirdos I'm alinaa I'm Ash this is more [Music] bed this is [ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ]
kid that's Mikey's big burp I like how that was just like oh we we're feeling some type of
way things are Loosey Goosey today we're at my house the luest and the gooiest I couldn't come up with a
response quick enough I at me blankly and I was like oh she gone it's early my coffee hasn't hit yet I tried to go to
yoga this morning I couldn't it was a whole thing forgot her mat halfway there and I [ __ ] realized it I was like are
you joking me are you joking me you're joking me mate true yeah um what's up dog what what's up dog you're almost
writing a book High I am almost riding a book high it's so close by the time this
comes out I think it'll be like two days ago that it came out so you'll be on the
high in the future this is awesome I'm so excited for you now and in the future I'm so excited I'm excited for you guys
to read the butcher game and and people have been grabbing the Butcher and the ren recently a lot like to start the
series which is so [ __ ] awesome well you have to guys like if you you have to if you didn't read the Butcher and the
ren I would read that before you read the butcher game yeah for sure it's set you all up it's all chronological yeah a
lot of backstory a lot of a lot of shockers you know but the butcher game is longer she she thicker she she I
think she's more brutal personally she 100% is there's no doubt my mind I don't think there's any doubt there um but
yeah you can still go go get her some go get her go get her she's selling like a
bestseller you won't be disappointed I think I hope I pray you won't I loved it I liked it better than Butcher and The
Ren and I loved Butcher and the ren I also have seen people who got the ark Advanced reader copies reviewing it and
I've seen like so many great reviews everybody who's reviewed it has been so sweet and so kind andov one girl she
posted a picture we should shout her out oh book talkers like books to grammars I
like books to grammar that's fun the prettiest like displays of a book yes it always they have a way of making me want
to read any book and espe it's like they always make it look gorgeous this one Creator on Instagram Michelle reads
Thrillers yes I was just I just saw that the way that she set the book up like to
take the picture of it I was like okay oh it's beautiful they're all like they're they're amazing that way yeah it
was Gorge I was I was impressed i l it I can barely take a good nail picture in my [ __ ] car so I can't take any good
photos of things sorry guys had a cat hair in my ey I have so many cats all the cats and I love them I also love
those cats yeah Franklin and I have become best friends so I mean we've always been best friends but I feel like
we really solidified our relationship the other day he crawled on my lap and he snuggled into me and I almost passed
away I like cats like I like cats just fine you're an animal person I just love animals yeah but like cats were never my
favorite like it just wasn't my thing for a long time but then I metor and I was like oh [ __ ] these cats
are cool that's the thing I feel like cats like like morph to their owner and I like to personally think that I'm like
wicked cool yeah so my cats are like wicked cool is it still in [Music] there well I'm glad you got that cat
High Holo W I'm glad you got that cat hair out of your eye I was going to say cat and then ey so it just went Kai
k it's still in there but you know by the end of this I'm sure it'll make its way out I don't see anything in there
yeah I wonder if you got glitter in there cuz your face is a little bit glittery did you got like highlighter in
your eye I don't think I got highlighter all right let's get into this so go we got part two of The Strange very
mysterious death of Cindy jeam very strange case so far super strange it's only going to get stranger to be honest
oh boy yeah so at the end of part one detective Bower Smith got involved in Cindy's case which was really starting
to ramp up he in the past had worked closely with Pat McBride who remember he was like the responding officer Cindy
started seeing him yep detective bowier Smith worked closely with him like I said and trusted him so he wanted to
trust what Cindy was saying of course but something in his gut was telling him that there was just just something was
off about her story something was missing his gut just didn't feel right about it so on a hunch he ended up
asking her to take a polygraph exam and unfortunately the results did literally nothing to alleviate his suspicions
whatsoever her test showed signs of deception but instead of confronting her with the results like right off the bat
he asked her if she'd be willing to submit to another exam and again the results indicated that she was being
dishonest being deceptive so so now he's convinced that he caught her going to lie cuz that's like you know I we I mean
we always say it h dog in a trench coat but like it's it is interesting when somebody because you can it's I don't
know it's like it really goes both ways like I feel like polygraphs are so difficult to have any kind of stance on
yeah cuz I know that like if you like if you're nervous that can show a deception
you hook me up to a polygraph right now I'm going to be my anxiety level is going to be at a billion just because of
the nature of being hooked up to something that can determine your physiological response to questions
brain would be like you're lying you're lying even if I was telling the truth that's the thing it's like when you go
through TSA at the airport and you're like know you don't have a weapon on you or like Contraband of any kind but every
time I go through I'm like what if I have a gun and I and I don't like I don't I know I what if I accidentally
put a gun that I don't have in my carry like oh my God what if I put a machete that I don't have in my God suitcase and
it's like so your brain will just make you go like oh [ __ ] I like that makes sense that you do that I think oh did I
pack a full-size product that they're going to throw out I literally I'm worried I bought I brought like a full
bomb with me I'm just like did I bring that new Hairspray that I got and I they're going to get rid of it and I'm
going to be sad yeah see that's and it happens all like your brain can trick you in insane ways so I feel like in a
polygraph exam you hook me up to that [ __ ] I'm going to be like have I lied about everything that I've ever known by
like I'd be like is anything real is my name even Ash they'd be like is your name Elena I'd be like I honestly don't
know my mom says I can't be sure but who she to say I don't know look I I was there but I don't remember that's the
thing well Cindy so berer Smith detective Byer Smith confronts Cindy with the results because of course it
means something yeah you know we laugh about how of that but like it it is interesting when you have
other suspicions especially having two deceptive is that a word deceptive yeah tests in a row you know that makes sense
so he confronts her with the results and she immediately bursts into tears which
honestly I probably would have done the same yeah but also it doesn't make you look great very suspicious but also yep
but also like at the grocery store if the Wind Blows the wrong way so just being
confronted with that would be horrifying oh yeah no I can't handle that and she couldn't either no and according to her
the reason why the results showed deception was because contrary to what she actually said in her statement about
the attack that happened in the garage how she was attacked by like multiple men and it got really violent she said
she actually did know the identity of one of these men who had attacked her but she was terrified that if she named
him he would return to harm her family okay and this is where I say well now that's suspish because yeah you are
you have now compounded what could be interpreted as a lie yeah on top of deceptive results of a polygraph exam to
cover the deceptive results yeah and it's just like I I don't it's just strange because again I can understand
that you if she's scared that this person will hurt her family family or hurt her if if she names them that is a
reality that many people go through in these kind of situations happens but it's also like but like this has been a
big part of your life right and if you know the name of one of the people we might be able to end this this could
stop right so why wouldn't you just say it right and also the police would be much more likely to be able to protect
you if they know who they're protecting you from exactly so it's like I to my initial feeling about that if I was that
investigator would be it kind of seems like you're you're trying to fix deception with more deception you're
yanking my chain is what he thought yeah and I but you can see it both ways I see
both sides of this cuz I I see her not wanting to to say anything cuz she's so scared and I see being on the detective
side of things being like what the [ __ ] then we can't protect we don't know if
you know who it is we can protect you from that person like right we can't protect you from an unknown human
exactly so the results of the polygraph exam were certainly unusual and her her response was certainly unusual and bow
Smith wasn't ready yet to rule out the possibility that she was lying but he also had to admit that it was hard to
believe somebody would keep up such an aggressive and pretty extreme charade for attention like he didn't he felt
like she was lying but also he was like why would she lie about this just for attention like and keep it going for so
long and cuz and and ramp it up you know and Cindy hadn't been alone in her claims and that was the other thing Pat
McBride was convinced that she was telling the truth and actually he himself even answered some of the phone
calls that were coming in like the weird obscene ones but in the cases where Pat
picked up the phone the caller would like heavy breathe and then hang up he Pat never heard the voice unless it was
on the answering machine now despite the chaos and stress of the ongoing harassment the other aspects of Cindy's
life actually seemed to be going pretty well relatively well she was well-liked she was successful at work she had
actually got several promotions between 75 and 83 the years not that many promotions I was like wow you're like
that's a lot of [ __ ] promotions but the after the attack in the garage she did file a workers comp claim so that
she could take time off to recover yeah and when she was ready to return her employer was really happy to have her
back but they requested that she attend a counseling session with a psychiatrist
that way they could clear her to return to a high press environment cuz she's a nurse remember yeah she's in healthcare
so she's in healthare that makes perfect yeah so the request to consult with a psychiatrist was immediately rejected by
Cindy unfortunately at that point she had nothing but negative experiences with mental health professionals I mean
that is true and also remember the time period mental health is still to this day stigmatized it's a lot better but
back then but back then seeking help for your mental health was seen as a weakness like just that's how it was
yeah and she was worried that she would be quote stigmatized as unbalanced if she went to see a psychiatrist because
and that could have something to do with the case too it's like could make her seem like she's admitting yeah you know
that maybe some of this is her head yeah and that's the thing I'm you led me perfectly to my next point because also
multiple officers with Vancouver Police already thought she was making everything up so she said well if I go
see a psychiatrist I'm probably only validating that belief yeah they're going to be like see it's exactly what
you said get that eventually she did reach a compromise with her boss and she agreed to see Dr Alex Conley who who was
one of the psychiatrists um associated with the clinic that she worked for oh yeah isn't that a conflict of interest
you think it's a conflict of interest now you just sit back and wait like you can't have her see someone who works at
the clinic she works for yeah you sure can't she's got to go to an outside place you would think that's Bonkers it
only gets Bonkers there oh Lord Dr Conley saw Cindy a total of six times before clearing her to return to work
which six times I think is pretty valid um uh but years later his consultation would be seen by pretty much everybody
as sus yeah me just straight up sus Like Pat McBride Alex Conley seemed pretty taken with Cindy oh and he didn't have
any reservations when it came to believing even the most suspicious aspects of her story oh my goodness
these mens he's she he just thinks she's really pretty which if you look up a picture of her she is beautiful but also
you got you're a professional you're supposed to be unbiased here exactly now now the other thing was he only saw
Cindy outside of his normal working hours what he hardly ever build for his services oh and this is my favorite part
he kept literally virtually zero written record or notes of their meetings nothing no record of their sessions huh
no I don't know how many of y'all are in therapy but they do be scratching down some notes while you're talking I would
imagine not Alice Conley garly yeah this was highly unusual given that the entire
reason she was seeing him in the first place was so that she could be evaluated for that worker's called claim which is
like you need some you need records you need receipts baby so all signs pretty much pointed to an inappropriate level
of familiarity between doctor and patient now that was that the threatening notes continue to arrive for
Cindy at home and at work throughout the fall and into the summer but by the Fall
things took another alarming turn and I'm just going to give a trigger warning here like up front for the rest of the
story just cuz otherwise I'd have to be like paing every five seconds give like a blanket one so right here blanket for
the rest of this story there is mention of animal cruelty and there is a lot of mention especially toward the end of
like suicide and suicidal ideations so if that's something that you're not down to hear
we'll exactly so on October 15th one year to the date after the harass M began Cindy found a dead cat in her
garden with a rope tied around its neck oh a note next to the cat read your next
that's terrifying uh-huh by that point she also had already moved two times and had changed her phone number but her
stalker seemed to have no trouble finding her each time which is shocking especially back
then it would take a lot to keep finding someone we'll find out later how if if there was a stalker and I'm not saying
there wasn't I'm just saying like I'm very much in the middle on this case I don't know if she was mentally ill I
don't know if there was a stalker I don't know but we'll find out that if there was a stalker it might not have
been that difficult for them to get information she was a little free with information oh she was giving stuff out
yeah exactly but a few weeks after the discovery of the cat she returned home to find her garden completely destroyed
plants were ripped from the ground tossed around the yard like it was a wreck oh that's just cruel yeah it is
mean mean and the increased frequency and aggression LED McBride to encourage Cindy to actually hire a professional
bodyguard probably a good idea yeah not a bad idea at all so she took the advice
and started working with Aussie cin he was a private detective and he was actually a friend of detective Bower
Smith's who had extensive experience providing Security Services to just private clients now hiring cin obviously
made her feel a little bit safer in her home home but it really didn't do anything to stop the harassment that's
wild it is and remember obviously he's not like 247 you know he's probably on call right but yes he is on call so in
late November just a few weeks after hiring this new security guard Cindy found another dead cat in her yard my
God who is killing cats I can't even talk about it it ruins me in the weeks that followed the calls in letters
started increasing in frequency and somebody started vandalizing the house smashing basement Windows cutting her
phone line like serious [ __ ] scary [ __ ] [ __ ] each time she reported the harsman and each time a detective was
sent out to the house to investigate but neither Vancouver PD or Aussie cin ever
found any evidence that anyone other than Cindy had been at the house oh just none whatsoever wow which is weird yeah
like if there is somebody they're really [ __ ] good at covering their tracks so
a few months later January 30th 1984 Cindy was actually attacked in her home for a second time around 6: p.m. she
called cin to tell him that she'd been hearing things outside of the house and she actually thought somebody was trying
to break in oh that's terrifying so he rushed over to the house and when he looked through the front window he saw
her lying on the kitchen floor and it appeared that there was a knife sticking out of her head her head her head h e a
d head holy [ __ ] yeah so he kicked in the door with such force that it actually ripped the entire frame away
from the from the wall oh see he like that's a man's that you want by your side get a whole door frame out
hopefully he knows how to replace it but so he rushed into the kitchen where Cindy is just laying on the floor like
unconscious my God and he expected to find the attacker probably still in the house because he rushed over there yeah
he's on call but there was nobody inside the house other than Cindy and the house
was completely silent completely still just nobody but she stabbed in the head well it turned out that Cindy had
actually not been stabbed in the head she was stabbed in the hand the angle with which she was looking like made it
look like like her hand was up or something yeah exactly but according this is still rudal according to the
police report there was a pairing knife stuck into her hand almost to the Palm so I'm assuming it went like the knife
went through the front of her hand holy [ __ ] and it was pinning a note like like
the knife was stuck to a note then stuck into her hand and the note said now you
must die [ __ ] yeah yeah and it was written in cut and paste magazine letters like the
classic like a like a ransom note yeah when the paramedics arrived it was determined that actually her injury was
not very serious which I'm like they must have gone like there's so many [ __ ] tendons in your hand yeah but
also she's in healthcare and I just want to point that out yeah just saying but it wasn't very serious and the head
injury that she suffered from from a supposed Blow To The Head was also not serious and the nylon stocking that was
tighter around her neck also did no lasting damage but this is the second time that there's a rope tied around her
neck like a nylon stocking and remember unfortunately like the cat there was a there was a rope around the cat too so
that's a that keeps happening okay but later at the hospital doctors would find a needle mark on her
arm which led them to believe that she had been injected with an unknown substance they couldn't determine what
it was but she had no recollection of being injected well here's my my question yeah there's a note that says
now you must die [ __ ] MH why didn't they kill her cuz it sounds like they didn't really make a
effort to because the head injury is not they didn't even not serious they didn't even know if there really was a
head injury she said that she'd been struck over the head and that she passed out so they're like okay she must have
been hit but there it was almost like um it was a case we talked about a few weeks ago where somebody said they've
been hit over the head and like they were only unconscious for a certain amount of time and the doctors were like
you would have been unconscious for much longer and that's and it's like it sounds like there was really no damn
like it wasn't even a serious injury to the hand but like they had op if they were in her house and she's alone and
they had a knife and a stalking with them yeah why didn't they just do it I mean I guess you could say that like
like maybe they heard and I'm just playing devil's advocate here maybe they heard cin coming and ran out the back
but it exactly it sounds like he didn't see anybody leave everything was silent everything was quiet I mean I don't I
don't know it's it's hard to explain it's just like and I'm not saying this isn't somebody doing this like trying to
torment her but it's just like wow you're really like you you had and you had the chance to do it right do it and
this person is like playing with fire she's reporting this to the police over and over over rolling the dice here and
if if they're stalking her they they know that they're seeing police presents at the house you know like I I mean this
this is shocking yeah it is now like the other reports of assault and harassment
the scene at Cindy's house appeared to be absent of any evidence of an intruder whatsoever see that's the part that I'm
like what is going on here yeah on the kitchen floor where she'd been laying there were circular smears of blood that
investigators found highly unusual like somebody tried to clean the floor Constable Kio eoma I hope I say that
right said it appeared somebody had wiped it and he said in his 10 years as an investigator he had quote never come
across a crime scene where an aelan attempted to clean up the blood I mean I've seen that in plenty of cases where
somebody tried to clean up the blood thank you cuz I we've covered cases where that's happened before maybe not
in his 10 years but in our six years doing this I've seen countless cases where people have tried to to blood at a
crime scene but I will say usually that's when the person that they have attacked is dead or when they think that
they're dead yes exactly you know at least and it to me it doesn't seem like there was anything done to Cindy here
that where they would think she would made them think she was dead agreed yeah but again I who knows but that I'm like
no people clean up blood all the time or and do it badly mhm that's literally why
luminol testing exactly but according to Cindy she had been in her kitchen when she uh when she saw who she thought was
her neighbor come through the back gate and up her back stairs carrying something in his hand but by the time
she realized it wasn't her neighbor the man hit her over the head she said she lost Consciousness which would be a
severe head injury you don't lose Consciousness from a head injury unless it's a serious one right exactly and I
mean they also said that she may have been injected with something so I don't know if that made her lose Consciousness
but they also couldn't determine what it was that she'd been injected with so it's kind of hard to say interesting but
given the suspicion with which her other reports had been met investigators asked
her actually to take another polygraph exam which if if she is going through this and she does have this stalker
who's attacking her again and again she polygraph tests yeah like that's sh the thing that's the part of this that
is just awful sad as if this is really what's happening holy [ __ ] but then you
can see on the other side of things why they want her to because they're like we're trying to help you here but
there's no [ __ ] evidence and there's a lot of evidence pointing to to you unfortun else doing this so it's like I
I you can't ignore that like you can't just be like okay yeah totally someone did it and we don't know who it is well
this one is weird because so she she consented to the polygraph test and at first her results showed that she was
telling the truth okay but then the PO I don't know if it's polygrapher polygrapher polygraph Giver I don't know
polygraph men I like polygrapher but polygrapher sounds fun cuz it's like calligrapher
exactly you yeah well this this polygrapher Sergeant Cal Hood he reviewed the results a second time
several months later for some reason and he quote decided they were inconclusive maybe they were looking at
it later as the case progressed probably but but it's like you can't you can't retroactively decide she was lying right
and and that's what Mak tell that at the moment my friend yeah and that's what makes people not believe in poly I feel
like because like you can just form them to fit your narrative yeah like that's that's literally you just fitting The
Narrative that that might have started spinning later cuz it was like no no no she's good she passed this one and then
I don't know if it was after she passed away that they were like she actually didn't pass that one she was probably
lying I'm like I don't know about that I don't know yeah but in addition to the polygraph exam Hood interviewed Cindy
for about 45 minutes and during that interview she told him that there had been quote periods of violence during
her marriage to Roy make piece and that her ex-husband quote This is Wild often talked about killing people with a
crossbow oh which I was like I thought you weren't afraid of Roy what like you cuz she was she told people all the time
that like like investigators were like could this possibly be your ex-husband saying and also the the stocking and
everything started within a week of her leaving him yeah which is strange so that is strange and I don't think he did
anything I'll say that right at the top but you're saying you don't think it's him
and then you're telling them also that like there's periods of violence and that he talked about killing people with
a crossbow yeah it's like come on that's and then we get even further later which
you're just your jaw is going to be on the floor but damn it's like hello but again so she she tells the detective
this but or the the polygrapher but then she continues to insist that Roy couldn't be the attacker so it's like
okay then why are you even saying this the math ain't math no but the attack in the kitchen was followed by several more
reported incidents of harassment and violence of course in July 1984 Cindy claimed that while she was out walking
her dog she was quote abducted and injected with drugs by two people in a van asking for
directions what after the report Aussie Cen arranged for a hypnosis session and during that session and this is where
your jaw is just going to hit the [ __ ] floor Cindy claimed she quote saw her ex-husband chopping up the
bodies of a man and woman with an axe at a log cabin somewhere in in the Gulf Islands while they were on vacation
other than that she couldn't provide any details um what yeah chopping up the bodies of a
man and a woman within a log cabin in the Gulf Islands while whilst on vacation my my this is escalating which
it's like what what where the [ __ ] did that come from nobody knows there's no there's no evidence that this ever
happened but it is a story that she that under hypnosis came out yeah so it's like she believes it how did your brain
come out with that I mean it seems like she believes it I mean also I think there are ways that you can seem like
you're under hypnosis that's the thing that I was wondering but holy [ __ ] and that that comes up again later and
you're just like what it doesn't come up in a in a way where you can really ver but terrifying Tale to spin yeah and
also like Abduction where did you go they just abducted you and then that was it
yeah she was able to get away I guess I don't know maybe I'm wrong here but I don't think people are just injecting
people with drugs willy-nilly I don't think well maybe like if they're being held captive like I I think we've seen
that happen guess but I mean like just like in an attack scenario yeah and then just leaving them like i' like I don't I
feel like that's a rare occurrence is someone like it it's like because it reminds me of like Dexter where people
use it as like a submission thing yeah like in the middle of an attack that is rare I think if we looked really hard
into the research of that I'm sure and this has already happened possibly three different times for her maybe even more
but in three different occasions mhm like that's and also it's like okay so what H and it's like unknown substances
too and I mean we're we're getting to the point where like things are more advanced in this time period like they
would have been able to identify what substances most things I would think this is bananas well it only gets more
bananas wow I don't know why I said bananas like that but it gets more bananas there bananas there that was a
good one so a year later in July 1985 Cindy made more claims of abuse and violence against Roy and this time
investigators actually convinced her to agree to a wire tap in order to try to get him to confess to something cuz
they're like is he a murderer like yeah at this point you'd be like what the [ __ ] is going on here but rather than
capture any kind of confession the recorded conversation actually depicted Roy makepiece as a very concerned and at
the same time very frustrated partner or ex partner h on the tape he can be heard
saying I'm certainly prepared to listen to anything because I'm very very very curious about what the hell has been
going on but it's affected me badly and it damn near cost me my job yeah I can imagine so I think he's saying like yeah
I I want to hear what's going on because I care about you but also what the [ __ ]
is going on cuz you're putting me in precarious situations here you're making me seem like I chop up bodies now yeah
seriously now eventually Cindy tried to elicit some kind of incriminating information she told him she quote
couldn't understand what he had been doing to her and his response was just straight up bewildering
he said incredulously what I've been doing to you for the last couple years like being like what yeah like what and
then he laid out all the ways where Cindy's ongoing harassment claims negatively affected his life and he's
like I'm not doing anything to you what the [ __ ] are you doing to me which it's
like why would he be lying obviously we've seen like deception like this before but it's harder to understand how
someone would lie in a private setting to the person they are lying about and to feain that much
like bewilderment exactly so ultimately the call produced zero confession or really any indication of Roy make
piece's involvement just one month later Cindy called police to report that somebody had actually broken into her
basement this time and set her bathroom on fire what the [ __ ] however when detective Gary Foster searched outside
of the house he determined that quote James was responsible because the cobwebs and dust were undisturbed on the
window sills outside oh [ __ ] so nobody had gotten into the basement oh damn in
April 1986 she again reported that somebody broke into the basement and set yet another fire but as in all the other
reports investigators found no evidence of a Breakin and concluded that she had to have set the fire herself why is she
doing this now you could say that this I mean this one these two incidents with the fire I believe that she may have
done these the evidence points to that I'm not saying that means that none of the other things happened like in the
beginning yeah I maybe they did maybe they didn't the this these two sets of things I think she did and I don't know
if it was maybe because thing she felt like things were ramping down and she for some reason wanted to ramp them back
up again or or maybe just capture the attention of the investigators to like to make something happen like in the
case like to to make them feel like it was more urgent yeah maybe maybe or maybe maybe this whole thing was
something she thought was happening I maybe she was disassociating the other thing like this is tragic no matter what
way it goes and it's so sad go story cuz it's like if this is in her head and this is something she's doing then she
is very mentally ill and very sick and this is that's and she's still living yeah in a place where she they her fear
seemed real and her you know Panic seemed real so it's like she's living in a horrible Panic induced state of her
own making without her even realizing it right or she's being tormented by a person or Unknown People and no one's
believing her right either way it's a [ __ ] nightmare this is awful no matter what or it's a combination of
both which is somehow even worse yeah honestly there's no better outcome here this is all awful and she's I don't this
is no kind of Life to Live it's really not it's really not well and honestly it seems like the police agreed that like
this was awful and they they felt bad for her according to the Press quote police wanted to charge James but didn't
because they felt she was suicidal and that feeling was correct a few days later Cindy was actually
admitted to the psychiatric ward of St Paul's Hospital where she was evaluated and eventually transferred to Riverview
Hospital which was another um like mental hospital for inpatient treatment and that was after her brother Doug
signed a petition to have her committed so even family was starting to wonder like is something going on here and they
they felt she needed help either way she does so throughout her hospitalization the doctors at Riverview consulted
regularly with Cindy's therapist quote unquote Dr Alex Conley that guy who said that he had been treating her since the
first attack in her home and he believed that she was quote and this kind of comes out of nowhere anorexic and
suicidal oh which I was like okay helpful yeah but he attributed Cindy's anxiety and depression to investigator
failure to catch her stalker but as author an Mulgrew points out he did not tell them that police were of the firm
opinion she was staging these events which what the [ __ ] are you doing not giving them the full picture and they
need like even if you disagree with it you can say like I don't personally agree but the police don't think this is
actually happening yeah you have to give the full picture that's going to inform
how they approach the yeah and how they treat her like that's pertinent information so while she was at
Riverview she was assessed by the hospital staff at various points including her initial assessment which
was performed by Dr Wesley freezen among among other things he described her as quote histrionic suicidal and requiring
close observation because of her impulsive behavior wow now so and this is like from the like from research yeah
somebody who's diagnosed as histrionic does sometimes like repeat behaviors for attention so this he was of the mind
like in this moment it seems that he was in of the mind that this may have been her doing these things yeah at the time
of her admission she was diagnosed with a paranoid disorder and major effective disorder with psychotic symptoms that
caused her to become quote increasingly hypervigilant and knows herself that she
has misinterpreted events because of this agitated State see that that makes sense to me yeah now regardless of
Conley's bias reporting Dr freezen quickly became suspicious of Cindy's frequent reports of harassment and
attacks but he also acknowledged at the same time that it was difficult to get an accurate history from Cindy because
of her agitation and her resistance to being treated yeah it's a total double-edged sword on every front it is
so before she was discharged from Riverside she would be evaluated again this time by Dr Sun Mo who described her
as quote negativistic and conforming with unpredictable moods pessimism sullenness vasil with social agreement
and friendliness wow in other words basically Cindy responded to a given individual depending on whether she saw
them to be a friend or an adversary who kind of didn't believe her mhm now uh Dr
Choy was more direct than Dr FZ noting that Cindy appeared to be caught in a psychological cycle of engaging in this
extreme behavior in order to escape feelings of being upset and feelings of instability but these events never
provided any lasting relief and that's why they continued she ramps them up it was a cycle it's like when you have when
you take medication too much and you need more and more to get the the feeling that you need to like yeah it's
it is like an addiction exactly Dr chro it is a picture of a paranoid schizophrenic patient with high levels
of anxiety and depression the psychotic features are evident that's really sad it is sad now although the harassing
phone calls and letters did continue in the in the years that followed her hospitalization at Rivers side there was
only one more report of an assault and that was in October of 1988 and during this assault she was or after it
happened she was found unconscious outside of her home according to her report she claimed
that she'd been assaulted strangled injected yet again with a drug but once again there was no physical evidence of
this attack yeah this is It's just sad really sad now the next notable incident occurred on April 8th 1989 when a
security at Richmond General Hospital where Cindy was working he discovered a note consisting of again those cut and
paste magazine letters so spooky I [ __ ] hate it and he found this letter and it said soon Cindy in those cut and
paste letters [ __ ] now when she left work that afternoon she reported to the same security guard that somebody had
written sleep well on the Dew in her windshield which is just chilling yeah she appeared obviously disturbed by the
discoveries but she didn't reply with the same level of alarm that she demonstrated in the past I think which
she could just be at this point like used to it she's been living it she's like oh great another one yeah on May
25th 1989 she went for some kind of cosmetic makeover in Vancouver and then she went to Richmond General to pick up
her paycheck friends and co-workers who saw her that day recalled her being upbeat and happier than she'd been in
years mhm that was the last anybody saw of Cindy the LA the very last time anybody saw her that day was when she
she deposited her paycheck at the bank after that she got into her car drove off and disappeared wow so on the
evening of May 25th 1989 she actually had plans with her neighbors to play bridge uh her neighbors were Tom and
Agnes Woodcock and around 10: p.m. they still hadn't heard from her so they knocked on our door but nobody answered
this was strange because they saw her earlier that day and also because her car was in the driveway they finally
became really alarmed when they peered into her car and they saw several bags of groceries on the passenger side um
seat and on the floor and on the floor in the back there was a Sears bag from her shopping trip that afternoon and
they became even more concerned when they looked down at the driver's side door and saw a quote unquote rustored
smear on the handle that they thought looked a lot like dried blood oh boy so this is [ __ ] yeah spooky not good now
after discovering the groceries in the car they drove to the nearest Department of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who
I'm going to call the RCMP from this point forward cuz damn that's a [ __ ] mouth yeah it is but they reported to
the RCMP what they found being pretty familiar with Cindy's uh frequent reports the RCMP dispatched officers to
her house and within a half hour the entire scene had been cordoned off with police tape and crime scene technicians
immediately got to work processing this entire scene they took swabs of the rust
colored substance on the door which did ultimately turn out to be blood and underneath the car they discovered an
ATM receipt showing that a deposit had been made into Cindy's bank account in the amount of
$1,173 and that was at 7:58 p.m. inside the car they found those four bags of groceries from the local Safeway they
found Cindy's purse which was just sitting on the front seat and inside her purse they found two sets of keys to the
house and to the car so the car keys were literally right there huh they found $277 in cash and her checkbook
with every single check accounted for Wow once the car was completely processed it was towed to the police
impound yard but it just looked like she pulled up to go inside disappeared just
like completely vanished now given that her purse and her keys were completely UND Disturbed investigators were pretty
much able to rule out robbery as the motive they also contacted all the local cab companies to see if maybe she had
like hopped in a cab and gone somewhere just didn't take anything with her but none had been called
so that was strange so they were like okay if she did leave she had to have left with a friend or a possible
abductor maybe we're wrong here maybe the only choice this is really ramped up now now believing they were searching
for a missing person the RCMP contacted the Canadian Coast Guard to conduct a search of the river while they handled
the ground search inside our house nothing looked unusual nothing seemed out of place it literally just looked
like she pulled into to the driveway and like we just said disappeared into the thing th her yeah the next day she still
hadn't been found so the RCMP officer started making the notifications to friends and family and really started
their formal investigation and of course they started with the most likely suspect her ex Roy
makepiece yes throughout the years of this repeated harassment and assault claims made by Cindy his name was the
only constant Factor they didn't have any other suspect whatsoever and he wasn't even really a suspect yeah even
if he wasn't always accused of anything specific they still wanted to talk to him and by that point he was so used he
was like accustomed to being interviewed so he was pretty unbothered by the intrusion he said since his divorce from
Cindy he had become increasingly drawn into her life of just constant drama but he maintained he wasn't responsible for
any of it and in the cases where he was present he was only there to make sure she was safe like when uh Pat McBride
found him in the car with like a gun it was just to scare off an attacker if he saw one which again like and I don't
believe he had anything to do with this after see like hearing everything but but it's sus but you can understand them
checking in on it because you're like well that is what an attacker would say yeah exactly that I was just there with
guns cuz I wanted to protect her and this is literally the only place they have to go right now so you might as
well start there yeah but he explained also to officers that he actually hadn't spoken to Cindy since that wired tapped
phone call nearly four years earlier oh damn yeah um and more importantly he was
also able to account for his whereabouts for the entire previous day it would have been impossible for him to abduct
Cindy now during their interviews with Roy investigators noted he didn't seem suspicious at all and they genuinely
believed that he didn't have anything to do with this yeah in fact despite everything that he'd been through with
Cindy like all of the her saying that he chopped up bodies on vacation and talked
about killing people with crossbows exactly through all of that he still believed that somebody had been
harassing her and genuinely thought she was in real Danger wow he even told police that as recently as that fall he
had gotten strange messages on his own answering machine alluding to a previously arranged hit on Cindy and he
believed the mafia could have been involved okay that comes out of nowhere go that pan out it it doesn't go
anywhere I don't think yeah I don't know about that this isn't saying Mafia to me
and I'm also like it doesn't ever sound like she like borrowed a ton of money or
got caught up in that anywhere like a very I'm like why yeah he seemed like a real heady kind of guy yeah you know
yeah that's a good way of putting it yeah but ultimately he was ruled out as a suspect now within a few days the news
about Cindy's disappearance broke in all the local papers and journalists focused
on what they described as quote dozens of complaints of harassment and threats in fact at that point there was nearly
100 in total I believe it yeah in an interview with a reporter Cindy's father Otto said on the day of his daughter's
disappearance that quote Cindy called her friend and indicated some people may think I'm paranoid but I have a feeling
I being I have been being followed all week huh which is strange yeah he told reporters it was possible that Cindy
maybe lost her memory and just couldn't find her way home but he admitted it was
quote more likely she has been abducted and held against her will or possibly even dead he said we have to hope she's
still alive but I fear she will be in very poor shape when she is found it's strange that he was like maybe she lost
her memory and just couldn't find her way home it's like what is that a is that a normal occurrence yeah like that
wouldn't be my first thought that wouldn't be my you were missing I wouldn't be like well maybe she just
completely lost her memory and can't find her way home I thought that be a thought I don't know if it was just
because weird [ __ ] was happening all the time in Cindy's life well and also I'm
like do you have an idea that maybe there's some mental illness happening that you're not really opening up about
right but that's a pretty good indicator of it that's kind of what I thought yeah
and or maybe I mean she's claiming in the past that she's been injected with things maybe they had phone
conversations with her where she sounded loopy or she just was telling them like
I've been injected I've been hit over the head so they're like she's got drama I mean they knew about the ordal that
she was going through so there's that yeah it's strange but on June 8th just a few days after Otto gave his interview
his fears were completely realized when a municipal Works crew who was patching pavement dis discovered Cindy's body in
this yard of an abandoned house What a Sad ending to this it is she was found about a mile from where she'd last been
seen at the ATM according to a neighbor who lived across the street from the house an old man lived in a van behind
that house but otherwise it had been unoccupied for months the neighbor said God knows what else is in there kind of
indicating that it was like a popular spot with like kids and vagrants that kind of thing n Dells n dwells partying
kids you know yeah now her was discovered in the bushes along the edge of the property she was fully clothed
with her hands and feet tied behind her back with a black nylon stocking like tied keep using the stocking yes
stocking again there were signs of advanced deom indicating that she'd been in the location for at least a few days
her blouse was torn in certain places but they said there was no other evidence of a struggle at the scene I
disagree her cloth they they also said her clothes didn't seem to have been Disturbed but I'm like her blouse is
torn so I would call that Disturbed personally but maybe they're thinking about maybe the way it looks is like it
doesn't really look like it was Disturbed it's just like ripped yeah yeah it's like a weird way of putting it
and um there was no foreign material on her body so that's a good thing but despite the lack of evidence of a
struggle the pathologist noted that one of her fingers had scratched another and
this is a quote down to the bone [ __ ] I'm like how is that even possible like like one of her fingers
had scratched the other one down to the bone huh which I'm like is it possible that she scratched like a lot and then
because of deom it yeah maybe it just sped up the deom scratching to get out of the the
bindings but I don't know because we'll get there but it led her to theorize that Cindy had been alive when she was
left in the yard otherwise there was no signs of violence and at that point no obvious cause of death what the [ __ ] the
autops was performed later that day by Dr Sheila Carlile at the Royal Colombian hospital and the first thing Dr car uh
Dr Carlile noticed was when she removed The Binding she said quote the ligature around one wrist was loose enough to be
easily slipped off over the hand oh shut up and none of the binds on the wrists and ankles were tight enough to indent
the skin what yeah that's very loose cuz immediately I was thinking was she like
what you said was she scratching to get the bindings loose but the were loose and they had to have been loose for
quite some time because there was no indentation anywhere that's bizarre right bizarre in
fact there was no bruising or injury on any part of her skin except for a small pin prick on the inner right arm just
below the elbow and that was determined to be consistent with an injection from a hypodermic needle what the [ __ ] based
on the insect activity the pathologist believed that Cindy's body had been in the lot since probably at least June 2nd
but it was possible she'd been there ever since she disappeared so earlier than June but initially the cause of
death uh was listed as asphixiation but when the toxicology report came back Dr Carlile changed the cause of death to an
overdose of morphine flopam and diazapam oh based on the examination of the stomach contents Dr Carlile
concluded Cindy had ingested the F aapam and the Dasa P which are both sedatives
in pill form she was able to to determine that but Cindy didn't have a prescription for either of those things
so that was strange that is weird and then the morphine was also believed to have been ingested orally in liquid form
and although it was impossible to know for sure Dr Carlile did theorize that the most likely cause of death was the
flopam in Cindy system and she suspected that Cindy had ingested anywhere from 20
to 80 tablets of that holy [ __ ] [ __ ] under those circumstances she would have
had about 30 minutes before losing Consciousness and that would have been quickly followed by coma and then death
so it's unclear just how it happened but within a day of the body being identified as Cindy James the Press
started Port reporting that RCMP officers were investigating the death as a quote unquote elaborate suicide whoa
which given how she had been found was very hard to swallow for the public because of course nobody believed that
that she could have possibly hog tied herself but when you with the bindings being so loose
yeah and I mean the medical examiner said she could slip a hand out mhm and they were so loose that they didn't
leave indentations she's also a healthcare worker and those were sedatives uhhuh which I'm it's an awful
thing to think about that like she took an enormous amount of sedatives to basically pass out fall asleep and then
die there overdose where she couldn't move basically it's hard to believe it is it
really is even when you lay it out logically and say like sure absolutely it could have been
because the the evidence leads you up to it right it's hard to believe it really
is I mean well there's no other case that I've heard of quite like this because then you think of the other side
of it where you're like if someone forced medication down her throat yeah to like make her pass out an overdose
and left her bound and made it did it loose on purpose cuz they knew she was going to die anyway and she but it's
like where did that finger thing come in where she was like scratching her finger
down to a bone like that part is that's the part that's hard to I don't know I just I can't make heads or tails of any
of I can't either I can't either but either way the reports of the suicide Theory seemed completely Preposterous to
anybody who knew anything about Cindy's ordeal over the previous decade and even
the work crew who found her flatly rejected that idea one of the workers told her reporter this definitely wasn't
a suicide You couldn't possibly put yourself in that position which I can see why he would think that I mean I
can't imagine finding somebody like that and then somebody being like Oh yeah they did that to themselves I'd be like
no they didn't no way but when you think about the loose bindings she very much could off now in the absence of an
official story from the RCMP the Press took complete control of the Nar native and they shifted their attention to what
they perceived as a complete failure on the part of law enforcement to protect Cindy despite the years and years of
complaints that she was filing one friend told a reporter the cops just never believed her and in an oped for
the province Vancouver reporter Patricia Graham wrote I feel disgust and anger sadness and regret that we let Cindy
down so badly Cindy James tried everything possible to protect herself she went to Vancouver and Richmond R
RCMP repeatedly she did her best but she still in Terror for 8 years worse she had to live through her personal hell
knowing that she was doubted that she was suspected of inflicting this on herself that her Terror was not
recognized or validated I mean yeah that's you can't you bounce back and forth between how [ __ ] terrible both
sides of this coin are no matter what the outcome is or what the process and journey of this whole thing was yeah
it's [ __ ] awful it is it does no matter what she was living in a state of Terror of either her own minds making or
reality and no matter matter what she was being doubted the entire time it's like we said it's just no way to live no
way to live horrible but while the Press continued their outpouring of sympathy for Cindy and cons the considerable
criticism of the RCMP investigators were learning a little bit more about Cindy's
life and the weeks leading up to her death the medical examiner report strongly indicated that she could have
staged the entire scene herself loose bindings those drugs could have been voluntarily ingested and the pin prick
on her arm was believed to have been the result of Cindy actually withdrawing blood from herself to wipe it on the
driver's side door whoa which is wild to think of anybody doing but it is possible especially when they're saying
that the drugs in her system were ingested not injected especially orally that's the thing exactly moreover in
their interview with Dr FZ they learned that Cindy had spoken frequently of suicide in recent sessions and she had
been hoarding quote unquote huge amounts of medication that he had been prescribing her in the months before her
death oh jeez yes and 2 months before her death she had actually stopped taking her medication and this is so sad
according to freezen she stopped taking it because the mortgage rate was going to go up and she couldn't afford the
prescription cost how [ __ ] up is that it's [ __ ] up that that's I mean this was like 20 something years ago or0
Stillen and it's still happening you choose to keep a roof over your head or to take the medication that you need you
have to choose right like that should not be any a choice that should just you should be able to have both yeah but the
hacks when they got to Cindy's house house actually flushed all the pills that they discovered there why I'm not
sure that's that's weird it's weird I don't know strange Behavior I I don't know I don't want to speculate I just
don't know yeah I mean people do strange things when they're grieving people do things to
make sure that somebody does not a certain SE in a certain way in certain perceived so like yes but no like you
can't do that like especially when you think she was possibly being like I don't know you just don't get rid of
anything I know but I don't know again people do do odd things when they're grieving that's the thing but the
medication was not the only discouraging discovery that they made when they searched her home while going through
Cindy's belongings a family member found a glass cutter a kit containing a syringe IV equipment a urinary catheter
uh and saline solution and then in one of her sewing k they found an unopened needle and
syringe oh no yeah I mean that's concerning all of that it's strange I mean the glass cutter that's the thing I
was I was just going to sayr she works in healthcare so like I guess you could have some of these things I don't know
on your person like why I mean not on your person but I don't know why they're in your house but a glass
cutter what I mean what's more important is she has access to these things exactly but despite all the newly
discovered evidence actually and this was surprising to me Dr FZ still had a hard time believing that Cindy had
actually taken her own life he told investigators I saw her the week before she disappeared and she was the best
I've ever seen her the most positive the most optimistic I've ever seen her I mean that happens that's that's a that
happens a lot that it's like a it's horrible to think about and it's chilling to think about but there's like
sometimes this Moment of clarity and peace that comes before something really tragic like this he said that she had
renewed her interest and commitment to reporting the incidents of harassment that she was going through he said she
felt confident that everything was actually going to be resolved soon which that's chilling thinking that that
was a discussion that was had right before that and given her mood her mood and her future orientation he just
couldn't accept the theory that the r RCMP was putting forth he said Cindy would not kill herself unless it was
accidental you know if it was an accidental suicide I could understand that I don't know if you can't really
say that with definitive no you're not someone's head you can't say they absolutely would not have done that you
can say I'm I'm finding it hard to believe that yes she would have but I'm not in her brain I think he cared about
her on like a deep level and I'm not saying on an inappropriate level yeah you mean like just cared about her
wellbeing I think he really cared about her and it was a shock that this had happened and I mean he's her Doctor Who
treating her that that hurts that you know he didn't like he I'm sure he felt like he didn't see the signs like he
wanted to help and he felt like he didn't or that he would have seen the signs so there's no way he could have
missed it yeah but on July 12th uh after more than a month of Investigation the RCMP reported that they were officially
ruling out fou play and that Cindy's death was going to be labeled a suicide according to Dr Tony Marcus who actually
evaluated Cindy several times and consulted with the investigators Cindy James was a quote in this is a quote a
borderline personality who weaved a tremendous plot to be the center of attention that's a quote quote quote
quote I'm not saying that he said that from a doctor a quote yes he also allowed for the possibility that she was
telling the truth but he said based on his experiences with her he's a Doctor Who's treating her and the abject lack
of evidence he felt it was just highly unlikely that she was telling the truth although the RCMP ordered a Coroner's
inquest to determine the circumstances of Cindy's death the investigator's official conclusion was a disappointment
to the hack course it was utoh hack told the reporters the rcmp's explanation didn't satisfy me at all there's a
murderer out there somewhere and I can totally understand that too because I that's her father no one is and who's
even sure of this I'm not you know initially the inquest was scheduled for October 12th 1989 but of course it got
pushed back several times and it didn't begin until late February 1990 in his opening remarks coroner Gerald Tilly
told the jury that the inquest would cover the 90 reported incidents of harassment between 82 and ' 89 so this
is literally what's that 6 years 7 years this um and they said there would be special attention paid to the
circumstances obviously of Cindy's death in May of 1989 and this inquest was only scheduled
to last for 15 days keep that in mind the first witness to testify was Cindy's one-time boyfriend Pat McBride and he
told the jury that she quote hinted to him that her former husband may have been responsible for a series of strange
in uh incidents involving harassing phone calls letters various incidents of vandalism he said she led me to believe
that a certain person may be involved her husband Dr Roy makepiece he also explained that he had caught Roy
makepiece lurking in the area around her house on more than one occasion but he could also at the same time never
establish any evidence that Roy was responsible for this harassment and it's like and she's telling everyone else
that he couldn't be the person but she's telling Pat McBride it is him right like what's going on
yeah now Pat McBride's testimony established the onset of the incident and who Cindy suspected may have been to
blame but it also highlighted the extent that law enforcement questioned these claims yeah pretty much from the
beginning he was one of several witnesses who acknowledged that Cindy seemed thoroughly resistant to taking
any steps to protect or remove herself from the situation especially after like I said she started giving her unlisted
phone number out to multiple people within weeks of having it changed McBride said the advice was coming from
someone with a vested interest in making sure she was Secure I didn't like the idea she was turning my ideas to not so
he's saying like I was telling her don't do that don't be giving out this information you don't know who this
person is and she still was his partner Andy Richards also testified telling the
jury that he believed Cindy had used a set of Pat McBride's wire cutters to cut the phone line while he was living in
the house holy [ __ ] yeah so again she had access to things that could have done that partner like another cop yeah
now although the RCMP and other agencies were obviously prohibited from speaking
publicly while this inquest was going on it didn't take a formal statement to figure out that there were several very
valid reasons for believing that Cindy could have been responsible for staging all of this a lot of the investigators
who testified noted that there was an almost near absolute lack of evidence to support these claims and despite the
count L hours of formal and informal surveillance I can never say surveillance I always say
surveillance but none of the investigators ever saw anybody suspicious on or near her property
that's that's wild and like in part one I said years of constant surveillance and years this person's just a ghost of
these people and like if you remember in part one I said um that I think it was like neighbors had seen strange unknown
men yeah like un unidentified men in the neighborhood how many times have you seen somebody you don't recognize in
your neighborhood and been like who the [ __ ] is that but it's just like a guy but it's just like some dude walking his
so it's like it absolutely could be something or it could be nothing could be nothing
exactly but there was also the matter of the failed polygraph oh my God I can't say polygraph and I can't say
surveillance see couldn't be I always say yance I don't know what that's about but there was the matter of the failed
polygraph examinations when Here We Go Again polygrapher polygrapher Vic farmer testified he told the jury that the
results indicated that she was Cindy was lying or lying in part about the attack
in January 1983 and he said when she was confronted with these results she responded by grabbing his arm and saying
Vic I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry and he said when she finally yeah he said when
she finally collected herself she changed various parts of her story but then refused to take a third polygraph
exam H Sergeant Cal Hood who administered a polygraph exam after the incident in
1984 reported a similar outcome where he suspected Cindy of being deceitful also included on the witness
list were a number of doctors and psychologists and psychiatrists who had treated Cindy over the years including
Dr Cho uh Dr CH excuse me Dr Marcus Dr Fen and Dr termon he was a psychiatrist from Riverview and in his testimony Dr
termon told the jury that Cindy was quote capable of intense attraction and intense rage at rejection and that could
have caused her to lash out and strange and irrational ways to try to Garner sympathy and attention while also
getting back at whoever she felt like had wronged her no matter how irrational that belief might be wow like she might
see it that somebody wronged her like and this is just an example like Roy wronged her I mean he did he hit her
yeah so she may have done something like this to get back at him and or Garner sympathy was this doctor's belief okay
now the RCMP and medical examiners case for suicide was a strong one but the authorities were hardly unanimous in
their opinion among those who were not in favor of the suicide theory was Dr Joseph noon a forensic psychiatrist who
was hired to review Cindy's medical record he heavily criticized several of the medical providers including Dr
Conley me too which I'm sure you can imagine why but he called them armchair psychiatrists and he said their meddling
in Cindy's treatment had potentially compromised the case to the point that they might never find the
truth I mean some of them were treating her though what's that some of them were
treating her like in Riverview yeah but it's like I don't know if they were meddling they were treating her I don't
think he was like he wasn't criticizing all of them he was criticizing some of them yeah small
because I was like Dr Connelly sure criticizing exactly but I'm like I don't know like the place when she was being
treated in a place it's like yeah they're just treating her and I'm and like Dr FZ and seemed like he was doing
a good job Dr Chay seemed a little more intense than Dr fzza but still seemed like still seemed like he was like in it
yeah exactly interesting but while noon clearly disagreed with several of Cindy's supporters it didn't mean he
agreed with authorities he said that her medical records actually read very clean
but he was in agreement with Dr Fen believing that Cindy was likely being harassed by an unknown party and that
resulted in depression anxiety and paranoia not the other way around interesting not that she was paranoid in
there for making this all in her head she was yeah but he believed actually this was happening and that's why she
was feeling this way okay among Cindy's most vocal Defenders was her private security guard aie cin who just really
seems like a sweetheart he's very out there but he seems like a sweetheart oh he's out there a little bit we'll see he
told the jury he just couldn't believe that she had stayed every incident of stalking and harassment not only because
she seemed super genuine but also because of what he believed was strong evidence that supported her claims uh
specifically with regard to the alleged uh 1984 kidnapping where she was abducted by those two people in the van
and like injected with something yeah he told the jury that he investigated the area where she said everything went down
where she got abducted and he found that quote the ground was dist Disturbed and
there were dragging marks okay which is interesting yeah you could make that yourself he's a
private security guard so I'm like it doesn't hold a lot of we exactly now after two weeks the inquiry shifted its
attention to Cindy's relationship of course with her ex-husband Roy makepiece like I think I said at the top of this
the harassment began within weeks of her separation from Roy and he'd been a regular feature in the reports from an
early phase of the investigation in name if not in presence while many witnesses
steered clear of accusing him of any wrongdoing there was a strong inference that he was involved in fact the jury
heard about that hypnosis session where she accused him exposive one yeah where she accused him of chopping up bodies
with an axe though the hypnotist acknowledged that it was possible she just believed the incident was real in
her mind which is also scary yeah absolutely what the [ __ ] but also that sucks for him if it was just like a
scenario that her mind created real or not though her sister actually added credibility to that story when she
testified that Cindy had also told her about this alleged murder in 1984 where Roy allegedly used a hatchet to quote
cut off a limb and spread blood on Cindy's face warning her I could easily do this to you too I'm sorry what
Melanie it should be noted that this was the first time any member of law enforcement had heard Melanie hack's
story about this and it was completely unverified yeah cuz where are where were you what is going on like you're
literally just bringing this up it was just something that Cindy may have reiterated to her and she
just you know said you know Now's the Time to share that Now's the Time to share that now after she's like she's
been going through all this harassment and stalking and like attacks and everything and it's
like you you got to tell the police yeah wow I mean I think the hypnotist told the police and they investigated it but
there was no evidence that this occurred but it's like what why aren't you saying
anything Melanie Wild o now surprisingly Roy never actually testified during the
inquest but his words did make it into the record in the form of that recorded phone call oh yeah the wire tap yeah um
he also had a nearly six-hour interview with BCE which was also recorded and that was after the attack in 1984 and in
his interview with Detective valer Smith he could be heard expressing his fears that he actually believed Cindy was
trying to frame him and he was disappointed that he was suspected of all of this he told the detective
firstly I could not believe I was a suspect let alone the only suspect everything I said was twisted now in the
end he actually received I mean like no sympathy from the investigators I mean on Fair counts because I mean they
thought he was strange first of all which it sounds like he was a strange character but also he had admitted to
spousal abuse yeah exactly so it's like I don't know you've lost it for me that's the thing but then at the same
time doesn't make you a murderer but it makes you a [ __ ] person yeah exactly but
at the same time they did see that he seemed unwaveringly committed to protecting Cindy at least especially in
the early years before they cut off contact but regardless of how they felt about him personally there was just no
evidence connecting him to the crimes and by the time Cindy recorded their phone call in 1985 it was clear that he
just wanted nothing to do with this anymore now like I said initially the coroner's request was scheduled for 15
days but by the time it concluded on May 25th 1990 it dragged on for more than 3
months and at this point became the most expensive inquest in Canadian's history
damn yeah in the course of hearing testimony from almost 75 Witnesses and reviewing countless documents the jurors
were told two versions of events one that strongly supported the belief that Cindy had taken her own life and another
where the evidence was a great deal more ambiguous and at least gestured toward the possibility that you know maybe she
was telling the truth about having a stalker and an attacker some of the testimony like I said Aussie cin is a
little out there um he believed that Cindy was murdered in a satanic ritualistic
sacrifice oh come on Azie he lost me there he lost me man yeah that testim wavering there that lost me yeah that
testimony was given very little Credence that's fair good other Witnesses including the various doctors who
testified that she may have taken her life obviously that was taken very seriously but in the end the jury could
not determine what had led to the end of Cindy James's life and the official circumstances of her death was uh
revised from suicide to undetermined wow yeah for the jury the inquest was particularly stressful juror Shirley
gahol said I not only cried myself to sleep but I cried in the courtroom too I can't imagine cuz they had to see tons
of graphic photographs I mean they saw the position that she was found in all these like crazy descriptions of
violence and they also spent months listening to conf fting opinions and testimony that at times became really
really heated oh yeah I'm sure and then you know this woman D died tragically either way so they felt this task to
figure out what happened but it was an emotional roller coaster she had such a sad life yeah another juror said there
were all shades of Grays no black and white in the end you felt you knew Cindy your heart just achd for the girl yeah
when it came time to deliberate they spent more than 3 hours just arguing with one another there was two uh in
favor of suicide and then there was three in favor of undetermined okay Jerry Foreman Len Rogers said it boils
down to nothing nothing firm pointed to Suicide so many things were just speculation that's the thing you can
just it's a double- seted coin here yeah I could I don't think I could have ever
made a decision and in the end they were right there was no evidence to prove that Cindy had taken her life and there
was no evidence that she had been murdered just like the 90 reports of harassment in her past the truth seemed
to just elude everybody fun but what we do know is that no matter what it's like
we've been saying this entire time this was a [ __ ] nightmare life whether it was mental illness or stalking she was a
victim yeah she was absolutely a victim of something whether it be mental illness or a deranged [ __ ] stalker
that it's just I mean it's possible like I'm not saying it's absolutely it's just
so hard to imagine like this level of yeah plan commitment and and ability to just never
be seen or detected in any physical way ever like there was never one shred of evidence left but I mean that happens
you know like I it's very few and far between but it happens yeah but I think it's still
an important story to tell because who knows she could have been murdered and if she was then this person completely
got away with it yeah cuz no matter she was a victim of something hopefully I just want somebody to like
find a box with all the documents and comb through them and just find one thing that points to the actual answer
can point to either way just give give them something because you feel bad it's just yeah it's an awful tragic tale no
matter what way it spins but it would be nice to have some answers I'm sure everybody who loved her goes back and
forth all the time in their own heads you know like what the [ __ ] happened here neither outcome is a good one so
it's like no how awful it is it's an awful case but a very very interesting one it is I've never like I said I think
I said it earlier I've never heard of a case quite like this no it's very very unique and very bizarre if you know let
us know because I found this fascinating tragic but fascinating yeah if you know
of another one like this it would it would be interesting to look into yeah definitely I also looked up the
pronunciation for polygrapher polygrapher polygrapher poer I mean that could just
be do just feel wrong it does feel wrong that just feels like when I'm reading and I accidentally read photographer
instead of photographer do you ever do that yep but then this person says polygrapher I guess you you probably say
both I like polygrapher I like polygrapher yeah it's fun yeah well um we hope you keep listening and we hope
you keep it weird but not so weird that we ever find the difference between polygrapher and polygrapher
never by [Music] [Music] [Music]

After opening an investigation into Cindy’s death, investigators learned that, for nearly a decade leading up to her death, Cindy James had repeatedly reported to Richmond Police that she was a victim of harassment, stalking, and assault, and had even turned over threatening letters and answering machine messages as evidence of the harassment; yet local police were unable to verify her story or intervene to protect her.

At first, Cindy’s death appeared to be the inevitable and tragic conclusion of a years’-long campaign of harassment and terror by an unknown stalker; however, when investigators began digging into Cindy’s personal history, they discovered evidence that contradicted their initial assumptions and pointed towards a far stranger explanation for her death.

Thank you to the incredible Dave White of Bring Me The Axe Podcast for research and writing support!

References Graham, Patracia. 1989. "We could have done better for Cindy." The Province, June 16: 37.

Hall, Neal. 1989. "Body believed to be missing nurse's." Vancouver Sun, June 9: 1.

—. 1990. "Ex-spouse angrily denied woman's lurid charge." Vancouver Sun, March 7: A12.

—. 1990. "James' ex-husband tells of fear police would frame him." Vancouver Sun, March 8: 19.

—. 1990. "James felt abandoned, ex-husband testifies ." Vancouver Sun, May 8: 16.

—. 1990. "James inquest hears of 1984 kidnap claim." Vancouver Sun, March 2: 15.

—. 1990. "James recalled bloody tale." Vancouver Sun, March 6: 19.

—. 1990. "Under siege." Vancouver Sun, March 24: A9.

Horwood, Holly. 1990. "James inquest a strain for jurors." The Province, May 31: 4.

—. 1990. "Nurse changed her story." The Province, February 28: 6.

—. 1990. "Threats, attacks preceded death." The Province, February 27: 2.

Jiwa, Salim. 1989. "Body is nurse's." The Province , June 9: 5.

—. 1989. "Somebody tailed Cindy." The Province, June 1: 4.

Mulgrew, Ian. 1991. Who Killed Cindy James? Seal Press: New York, NY.

Pemberton, Kim. 1989. "Strange ordeal of Cindy James." Vancouver Sun, July 13: 17.

Vancouver Sun. 1989. "Abduction feared by nurse's dad." Vancouver Sun, June 2: 37.

—. 1990. "Conflicting evidence fabricated tangled puzzle for inquest." Vancouver Sun, May 29: 9.

—. 1990. "Coroner's jury to hear of mysterious incidents." Vancouver Sun, February 26: 21.

—. 1989. "Police ask help in locating missing nurse." Vancouver Sun, May 30: 33.

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Brief Summary

Cindy James's mysterious death raises questions of stalking, mental health, and the investigation's failures to protect her.

Key points

The Butcher Game Release. Excitement builds as the release date for 'The Butcher Game' approaches.
Cindy's Alarming Discovery. Cindy finds a dead cat in her garden, escalating the tension in her case.
A Chilling Note. Cindy is attacked again, this time with a knife and a threatening note.
Mysterious Injection. Doctors find a needle mark on her arm, raising questions about an unknown assailant.
Hypnosis Revelation. Under hypnosis, Cindy claims to have seen her ex-husband committing a gruesome act.
Police Doubts. Police suspect Cindy may be staging her harassment claims, complicating her case.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I'm so excited for you guys to read the butcher game!

Excitement about a new book release

1:17WatchSep 19, 2024

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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