S9 E8 Open & Shut

It's a family rumor, a memory passed from one generation to the next, except some of the details appear to overlap with what we already know.

In a letter written one year after the murders, Lizzie and Curly's daughter, Margaret, mentions police bringing her a ring and a wristwatch they believe belonged to her mom.

In the partially released RCMP records from the case, there is a reference to a search carried out in the Queen Charlotte Islands in 1960.

Three exhibits were seized and sent to the lab.

Now, this raises the question, who was Nanaimo John, and what did police know about him? The answers may be sitting inside the very file the RCMP has yet to release in full, and that brings us to an even bigger question at the heart of this series.

When a murder remains unsolved for nearly seven decades, who gets to decide what the public has a right to know? It's also another reminder of how violence and secrecy can impact not just the family, but the wider community for decades.

If an unsolved case is open and active in Canada, it's unlikely the police will say much about their investigation.

In fact, it's not unusual for them to say nothing at all.

But in a case almost seven decades old, I imagined accessing information would be easier.

In fact, an RCMP inspector told me that given the age of the case, privacy concerns would likely not apply.

Still, when the release package arrived from the RCMP, I expected there might be gaps, that names would be removed and certain details withheld.

But what we received was something else.

There were pages covered in black ink.

Entire sections gone.

A record that seemed to create more questions than it answered.

Both Shauna and I have launched complaints to Canada's Information and Privacy Office.

And now, once again, we wait.

There are good reasons police files are kept secret.

Real reasons, like protecting witnesses or protecting informants.

These protections exist for a reason, but the Kosteniuk file is almost seventy years old.

The people who were there are mostly gone.

The world that surrounded this crime has virtually disappeared.

So how much longer can a file remain closed before secrecy itself becomes part of the story? To understand that question, I speak with James Turk.