Canadian True Crime - The Murder of Sharron Prior

Episode Date: September 18, 2026

One cold March Saturday night in Montreal, 16-year-old Sharron Prior sets off for a five minute walk to the local pizzeria to meet friends. She never arrives.Three days later, a local beekeeper makes a devastating discovery in an isolated field: Sharron Prior has been brutally murdered. Who was responsible? And could it be the same man who attacked another local woman that same night?This is the story of a case that haunted Québec for decades, the family who refused to give up, and the breakthrough that finally brought the answers they were looking for.---------------------The intention of this episode is to take a look back at a high-profile crime sensationalized through headlines, explain how it was solved, and how it impacted the local community. Please respect the privacy of the people involved in this case. Additional content warning: this crime is murder and sexual assault of a teenage girl. Minimal graphic details will be given. Please take care when listening.More information:Resources for victims/survivors: Ending violence CanadaSharron Prior website - http://sharronprior.com Watch “Finding Sharron’s Killer", CTV’s W5 series on YouTube:Part 1: Montreal Teen Murdered in 1975 Part 2: DNA Evidence Unlocks the MysteryCanadian true crime donates monthly to those facing injustice. This month we have donated to the Association for Families of Persons Assassinated or Disappeared (AFPAD)Look for early, ad-free release on CTC premium feeds: available on Amazon Music (included with Prime), Apple Podcasts and Patreon.Full list of resources, information sources, credits and music credits:See the page for this episode at www.canadiantruecrime.ca/episodes/221 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Canadian True Crime, a completely independent project funded mainly through advertising. To listen, add free and early, subscribe to our premium feed on Amazon Music Included with Prime, Apple Podcasts, and Patreon. This podcast often has disturbing content and course language. It's not for everyone. Please take care when listening. Hi there. I hope you're well. I'm Christy Lee and I'm so happy you're joining me for another episode of Canadian True Crime. I also want to say a big thank you for all the supportive and kind messages you've sent after the case updates episodes. I appreciate it so much. Today's case centers on the murder and sexual assault of a teenage girl, a case that baffled investigators and might have been forgotten had it not been for the persistence of her family. Please take care

when listening, and our sincere condolences to her loved ones and anyone else affected. To piece this case together, we relied largely on the news archives, most notably the daily reporting of the Montreal Star, the Montreal Gazette, Nouveau and CTV's W5 program, as well as the family's website, Sharon Pryor.com. If you know anyone related to this case, please respect their privacy. And with that, it's on with the show. It's Easter weekend in Montreal, Quebec, and 16-year-old Sharon Pryor has spent much of her Saturday at home, painting Easter eggs with her family. Sharon lives with her mother, Mrs. Yvonne Pryor, and her younger siblings in Pointe St. Charles, a working-class neighborhood just south of downtown Montreal. Sharon's parents had divorced a

couple of years earlier, and while her father's involvement with the family appears to be minimal, Mrs. Pryor dotes on her children. The eldest Sharon at 16, 14-year-old twin sisters, a 12-year-old brother and a four-year-old boy the family is fostering. Some time after painting Easter eggs together, they sit down for dinner. It's stew, which Sharon doesn't particularly enjoy, but she says she's really looking forward to the turkey dinner they'll be having the next day, Easter Sunday. Sometime between 6 and 7 p.m., a neighborhood friend of Sharon shows up for a visit. Sharon tells her that she's getting ready to meet up with her boyfriend and some other friends,

but invites her into chat until then. Sharon Pryor is academically gifted. She's won multiple awards and is known for her love of science. She's always conducting little science experiments of her own. Sharon has long strawberry blonde hair and an easy smile. She loves sports, especially hockey, and she's a popular student at school, described as spunky with a great sense of humour, warm, friendly, but also sensitive and a little shy. And Sharon has an especially strong connection with animals. She's constantly bringing home strays to care for. Her mother would say her greatest pain was seeing animals hurt.

There would be cats and dogs, rabbits kept in the bathtub, and on occasion her sisters would discover the odd little turtle somewhere in the house. Sharon already knows what she wants to do when she finishes school. She wants to become a veterinarian, but she's only in grade 10, so there's plenty of time for future plans. That Saturday night before Easter, Sharon is planning to do what many local teenagers do on a Saturday night. Head to Marina's Pizzeria. It's a popular hangout for students from her school and she plans to meet up with her boyfriend John and some friends there. Sharon tries on some different outfits while her neighbour friend looks on.

They joke about how many tops she has to try on before deciding on her final outfit. outfit. She's wearing blue jeans, a sweater and dark-colored shoes. She wants to wear her three-quarter length brown suede jacket, but it's raining outside and she doesn't want to ruin it. She asks her mum. Mrs. Pryor reassures Sharon that it's just a drizzle. The jacket will be fine. Sharon's neighborhood friend offers to walk her to the pizzeria. It's around 7.15 p.m. by this point, so it's not late, but it is dark outside, and it's March in Montreal, so most days the temperature is below freezing. Sharon shakes her head. It's only about a seven-minute walk from her house. She'll be fine. She tells her neighbor to enjoy her night and says goodbye to her mother, who yells back,

Goodbye, Sharon, be careful. That's what Mrs. Pryor always says to her children when they leave, but she's not really worried at all. Sharon has never been a problem, and she's trustworthy and reliable. The 16-year-old is usually back by curfew, and if she needs an extension, she's always found a way to call home. About two hours later, Mrs. Pryor answers the phone at home. It's one of Sharon's friends. She doesn't want to scare Mrs. Pryor, but she just heard that a woman

was attacked on Ash Avenue earlier that evening, just down from Marina's pizzeria. The friend immediately thought of Sharon and wanted to see if she was okay. 14-year-old twin sisters, Maureen and Doreen, are listening to the conversation, and they notice that their mother immediately becomes frantic. Mrs. Pryor hangs up the phone. suddenly overcome with the feeling that something is terribly wrong. Typically, Sharon is home by 11. On some occasions, she's asked to extend her curfew as late as 1am. Right now, it's only about 9.30 or so, so there's really no logical reason to worry, but Mrs. Pryor cannot shake the feeling. All she can do is hope that Sharon comes home soon. She waits with the twins,

in the living room, looking out the window, willing Sharon to come walking down the street, anticipating the innocent explanation that will surely come. But that doesn't happen. Midnight passes, then 1 a.m. At some point, Mrs. Pryor learns that Sharon didn't show up at Marina's pizzeria at all that night. She calls the police, she tells them that she tells them that she heard a woman was attacked earlier that night near the pizzeria her daughter Sharon was walking to. It was supposed to be a seven-minute walk, but she didn't make it, and she hasn't returned home. They have no idea where she is. The police tell her not to worry.

There was another woman attacked, but it's not connected to Sharon. She's probably just gone to a party and lost track of the time like teenagers tend to do. Or maybe she's taken off in a moment of rebellion. She'll be back soon. They've seen it many times before. But Mrs Pryor knows her daughter. Sharon always lets her know where she is and when she'll be home. She goes into Sharon's bedroom in a last ditch effort to see if anything is out of place.

Her school bus pass is on the dresser, along with some money. Sharon has never run away before. She's had no reason to. But if she did run off for some reason, surely she would have taken the money. Still, the police tell her to keep waiting and call back in the morning if Sharon's still not home. It's an incredibly tense rest of the night.

Sharon does not show up. That was Saturday, March 29th of 19th. The following morning is Easter Sunday. Mrs. Pryor should be preparing their Easter turkey dinner. But instead, she reports her daughter missing to the police and spends the day waiting in agony. Her gut instinct was right all along. Something has happened to Sharon.

There's just no other explanation. She's also remembered something that might be relevant. Sharon and her boyfriend. friend John told her that in the last few weeks, they noticed a man who seemed to be following them, or following Sharon, on several occasions. They didn't know what to think about it at the time, and they didn't give Mrs. Pryor any details to describe the man, but she passes the info to the police in the hope that it's useful. As a search begins, investigators speak with everyone close to Sharon, her boyfriend John and friends she said she was going to meet at the

pizzeria, other friends and acquaintances, neighbours and local residents. This is one of several areas in the case where the details are a little vague. When did Sharon's boyfriend or friends notice she hadn't shown up to the pizzeria? It's unclear if they were even expecting her that night, if they contacted Mrs. Pryor, or if Mrs. Pryor phoned the pizzeria. It seems that Marinas was the place to be if you were a teenager in the Pointe St. Charles neighborhood looking for a casual Saturday night hangout where everyone knew people would be gathering. It's possible there may have been no firm plans that everyone just showed up. It's unclear if Sharon's boyfriend and friends raised any kind of alarm,

or just assumed she couldn't make it that night. What is known is that the police ultimately cleared them of any involvement in Sharon's disappearance. So the last known people to see Sharon Pryor alive were at her home before she left for the seven-minute walk. That neighbor friend who offered to walk with Sharon likely wished she was more firm about it. Before long, a large-scale search for

Sharon is underway, with a local community coming together to search for any sign of the missing 16-year-old. Many of them are Sharon's classmates from high school. Others don't know her at all, but they all have a common goal. This is 1975, long before the systems that would later be created to quickly spread information about a missing young person. There's no Amber alerts, no child find organizations. There's no social media or online networks. There's no computers. The only tool they had was searching on foot and so far there was nothing. By Tuesday, April 1st, Sharon Pryor has been missing for almost three days and police and volunteers are still out searching for her. But hope is starting to run out. Her mother and siblings are

beside themselves. Mrs. Pryor has barely slept since her daughter disappeared. Reporters are camped outside the home and she's overwhelmed. All she can think to say to them is that she's been going through hell and quote, I just want my daughter back. That Tuesday night, about 20 kilometers away across the St. Lawrence River in the nearby city of Longgale, A co-owner of a beekeeping apiary shows up to the field where the beehives are kept. He notices that something isn't right. The gate leading into the field is supposed to be closed and locked with a padlock, but the gate is wide open.

The beekeeper is immediately suspicious. There's no reason for anyone to be there at 9pm on a Tuesday night. He walks into the field to check. his beehives and make sure nothing is amiss. The ground is frozen. In some places it's snow, and in others it's a mixture of thawing snow and mud. That's when he sees something out of place near a wooded area in the bushes. He walks over and is immediately taken back. There's a brown piece of fabric covering something underneath, extending out the side, is a leg, plainly visible. Longgale police arrive at the beekeeping apiary. With no one else

of that description reported missing in the local area, they operate on the assumption that it is Sharon Pryor, although they'll need a formal identification. The beekeeper points them in the direction where the body can be found, about 200 metres from the road. The piece of fabric covering her is a three-quarter-length brown suede coat with a belt, and there's another piece of fabric tied to that belt. It seems to have been used as a crude method of restraint to secure her hands behind her back. That piece of fabric turns out to be a blue men's dress shirt

much larger in size than the brown suede coat. She's only wearing a sweater, socks and shoes. Her shoes are clean and dry compared to the ground. She's naked from the waist down and her pants and underwear are missing. There's tape around each of her wrists. In one of her hands, she's clutching a tree branch. It's a haunting detail. There's another piece of tape tangled in her strawberry blonde hair.

It's stained with blood and seems to have been partly chewed, like it could have been used to gag her. It's not immediately evident how she died, that will be determined at autopsy. What is clear is that she's been badly beaten. About six feet away, police find a discarded pair of women's jeans, and hanging from the nearby tree branch

is the pair of missing women's underwear. Investigators move further away from the body, examining the ground. About 15 feet out, they spot a fresh tire track. There's traces of red blood beside it. More measurements and samples are taken. Investigators carefully examined the gate to the field that was supposed to be padlocked. They see the padlock itself isn't broken and there's no evidence that it's been tampered with. It must have been opened with a key. The be The innkeeper says the field is co-owned, and there are several people who have keys to that padlock, but he can't think of any reason why any of them would be there that night.

Police make a note to investigate further. They also see a fresh footprint right next to the gate. By the time they finish documenting the scene, police have collected more than a dozen exhibits to process. No weapon has been found. The next morning, it's Wednesday, and Mrs. Pryor sees a man she knows across the street, reading a newspaper and glancing her way. Something about his behavior immediately worries her.

She calls out to him and asks him what's in the paper. He's evasive. At this point, she's too on edge for social graces, so she runs across the street, takes the newspaper from him, and returns to her house with it to take a look. It's the Montreal Matan, a popular morning tabloid at the time with a heavy emphasis on local crime stories, accidents, fires and other dramatic everyday events in Montreal, told in a sensationalistic way. And today's issue has a giant photo on the front page, clearly overexposed and taken at night. It shows a bleak wooded area with a partially covered body lying on a patch of snow.

There's a leg extending out from it. On the foot is a dark shoe with a light-colored stocking or sock. And there's an enormous word printed on the photograph. Assassinei. Murdered. Mrs Pryor lets out a high-pitched scream that sends the twins, Maureen and Doreen running in from the other room. She screams, it's her, it's her, it's her.

It's a sound the twins would never forget. According to the caption under the photo, the body of a girl about 15 years old was discovered the previous night in a wooded area in Longgale and police are investigating whether it belongs to a young girl reported missing from Pointe St. Charles. Tragically, this is how that young girl's mother and siblings first learned that Sharon's body had been found. Somehow, details from the crime scene and a photograph had been given to local newspapers in time

to make the cover of the morning edition before the police had informed the family. Shortly after that, they arrived to ask Mrs Pryor to formally identify the body. She says she can't do it. She doesn't want to see her daughter like that. So her brother goes instead. He isn't able to identify Sharon's face. She's been too badly beaten. But he sees a familiar birthmark on the back of her neck.

When Mrs. Pryor is informed that a match has been confirmed, she becomes hysterical in her grief. The family doctor is called and she's prescribed sedatives. When the media approaches for comment, Mrs. Pryor tells a family friend to pass on a message. All she wants them to know is this. Just tell all mothers to watch their children and love them.

Family and friends do their best to comfort her, but she can't stop thinking about her daughter's final moments. Mrs. Pryor has a complete breakdown, haunted by thoughts of what might have happened to her daughter. The twins would later recognise that as well as losing their sister that day, they also lost their mother for some time. She will need to be hospitalized for six weeks, but she will find her way back. The police formally announced to the public that Sharon Pryor has been found murdered

and they answer the questions of local residents. They don't know the questions of local residents. They don't know the cause of her death yet. They're waiting for the autopsy. Despite the days of interviews and canvassing of the neighbourhood, they have no information about what might have happened to Sharon after she left her home to walk the short distance to Marina's pizzeria. No witnesses have come forward to say they saw her or noticed any kind of struggle. The only theory police say they're prepared to discuss publicly is that Sharon might have been kidnapped off the street by a stranger. But investigators haven't completely ruled out another possibility,

according to the Montreal Star, that the 16-year-old might have met a man on the way to the pizzeria and willingly left with him. It's a possibility that seems to have come from nowhere. Sharon had a boyfriend and she'd never rebelled even a little. There was nothing to suggest this was something she would ever do. But the fact that investigators entertained this theory fits a familiar pattern, particularly for the time. When girls and young women are victimized, there's often some explanation that shifts a little or a lot of the responsibility back onto them.

At first, it's, maybe Sharon ran away. Now that she's been found murdered in a field, it becomes, maybe she had a secret promiscuous side and willingly went off with a man she'd just met who then killed her. Even though everyone who knows Sharon personally also knows there is no way the theory could be true, it must have been incredibly upsetting for her loved ones to hear the police mention that as a possibility. The neighbourhood is shaken by the thought of Sharon being kidnapped by a stranger.

They're afraid for their children's safety, and there's something else on their mind as well. Remember that phone call Mrs Pryor received from Sharon's friend about two hours after she left, saying a woman had been attacked just down the street from Marina's pizzeria? Local residents wanted to know if there was any link. Could that be the same man who kidnapped and murdered Sharon Pryor? Or were there two terrifying offenders on the same. the Luce. The Montreal police confirmed that they did receive a panicked call that same night from

23-year-old Cheryl Waugh, a local resident who had just escaped a man who attacked her. Cheryl Waugh agrees to be interviewed by the Montreal Star. She says she was walking to the pharmacy to buy diapers for her baby when she saw a man coming towards her on the other side of the footpath with his hands in his pockets. She noticed he was pretty tall and wearing cuffed blue jeans, a dark ski jacket and black shoes with pointed toes. But he wasn't doing anything unusual and they passed each other without incident. A short time later, Cheryl heard footsteps behind her moving quickly. She turned around and saw the same man coming up behind her.

He grabbed her around the waist with his left arm and wrapped his right arm around her neck. Cheryl caught sight of a black handle, followed by the long blade of a switchblade. The man held her so tightly that her head was forced backwards, making it difficult for her to see his face clearly. She fought back as hard as she could. The man told her to she.

shut up and began trying to rip off her pants. As she screamed and struggled, the knife cut her right hand and her neck. Sheryl begged him to take her purse instead, but he told her in English, I don't want your purse, I want you, I love you. During the struggle, the man threw Cheryl against a brick wall, grabbed her by the hair and began dragging her backwards, telling her, you bitch, you're coming with me. He dropped the knife and Cheryl managed to kick it away. He told her, You're dead. You're not getting away from me.

When I get through with you, I'll cut you to pieces. Suddenly, a young boy Cheryl knew came down the street, yelling. He'd heard the commotion. The yelling was enough to scare the man off, and he fled down a nearby side street. Cheryl managed to crawl to a nearby house where she called the police. The timing is significant. Police received that phone call at 7.20 p.m. Cheryl estimated her attack lasted around six minutes,

which means it happened at around 710 or 7.15, which is around the same time that Sharon Pryor left her house for the short war. to the pizzeria. If she took a shortcut via the side streets, she would have come face to face with a man fleeing after he attacked Cheryl Waugh. Cheryl remembered a number of specific details about him. She didn't look at his face very long, but she estimated him to be in his late 20s, six feet tall with blue eyes and brown curly hair. He had a moustache that was squared off at the corners of his mouth, and when he spoke, she didn't smell any trace of alcohol. The fact that he spoke native English is an interesting detail for investigators.

French is the dominant language in Montreal, but at the time, the Point St. Charles' neighbourhood has its own unique character, working class, industrial and deeply anchored by its history as an Irish immigrant railway and canal hub. For generations, the neighbourhood known as The Point retained a population that is heavily English-speaking. The prior family speaks English as well. Things are different today, but for the investigators at the time,

an English-speaking man in The Point doesn't necessarily stand out. But it's a close-knit neighborhood where everyone knows everyone else, and Cheryl Waugh's description of the man who attacked her was fairly specific. A tall, solidly built man in his late 20s with curly brown hair and a handlebar-style moustache. Despite all the questioning and investigating so far, police hadn't found anyone who fit that description yet.

Local residents were drawing a blank. Police reassure the public that the investigation is progressing rapidly and they do expect further development soon. Until then, they urge anyone who has information or tips that could help the investigation to come forward. The autopsy shows that Sharon Pryor was sexually assaulted and repeatedly beaten with most of the violence concentrated around her face. It was bruised extensively, including both her eyelids. She had several jaw fractures. She had several jaw fractures. a broken nose and a hole in one cheek,

likely caused by a tooth loosened during a struggle. There was also a half-inch deep cut to her scalp that reached the bone. The report concludes her facial injuries were highly suggestive of violent punches. The cause of Sharon's death was an internal hemorrhage, which resulted in blood pulling in her lungs, causing her to exphyxiate, suffocate. The medical examiner theorizes that the hemorrhage may have been caused by the offender crushing her chest with his knee. The medical examiner agrees with police that the piece of white tape found in Sharon's hair had been used as a gag. And finally, Sharon's estimated time of

death, because three days had passed between when she disappeared and when her body was located. The medical examiner isn't able to determine an exact date or time, but concludes Sharon did not die the same Saturday night she was kidnapped. Her time of death was likely sometime in the 24 hours before her body was located on the Tuesday night. That means the prior family had to consider something horrific. Sharon had been kept alive somewhere for at least two days. Sharon Pryor's funeral was held on April 5th. More than 200 people attended to remember a 16-year-old girl

who should have had her whole life ahead of her. In later interviews, Mrs Pryor would describe Sharon as a beautiful and friendly girl that everyone loved to be around. She was bright, she had a bright future, and she knew what she wanted to do in life, until someone decided to cut it short in such brutal and senseless circumstances. Once the available evidence is logged, processed and analyzed as much as possible at the time, the police develop a theory.

It's clear that the man planned his attack and already identified a location to dump a body, the isolated field in Longgale that was used by beekeepers to house their hives, and he likely also knew that it was the off-season for beekeeping. How did he know that? The police haven't figured that out yet. But for all intents and purposes, their theory is that the offender identified this field in an industrial area, knowing he could dump a body there and it likely wouldn't be found for a few more weeks when the spring beekeeping season began.

The police theorized that on the Saturday night in question, the man came to the point specifically looking for a young woman to target. He failed to capture Cheryl Waugh and had to flee down a side street, likely filled with rage. That's where police believe he came into contact with Sharon Pryor walking to the pizzeria. He wasn't going to let her escape like Cheryl had. The evidence of when Sharon's death occurred suggested that she'd been held captive, by the man for the next two days at least. He restrained her wrists with tape

and used his own shirt to secure her hands behind her back. He sexually assaulted her and brutally beat her. Then he transported her about a 20 to 30 minute drive over the bridge to the beekeeping field in Longgale. The fresh footprint at the gate suggested he got out of the car to open it, so it seems the gate was closed at least, but that padlock,

and the fact that it had not been tampered with, was a mystery. Police had chased down the owners of the field, but only two people claimed to have a key to the padlock on the gate. The details are again vague about this, but the beekeepers and owners were ultimately cleared of any involvement. The police are continuing to investigate who else might have actually.

to the field, who might have had duplicate keys, but it's taking time. The fresh tire track showed the man drove his car into the field towards a wooded area, and his car had relatively new radial tires that police learned were only used on 37 vehicle models at the time, too many to track sales records and interview owners, but it might be good corroborating information against a suspect if they located one. The traces of blood beside where the tyre track ended matched to Sharon Pryor, and because her shoes were clean and dry, the police believed she was likely beaten before she left the vehicle.

The man then carried her a few feet into the wooded area as she grasped at tree branches along the way. Police believed the man threw her on the frozen ground, crushed her chest with his knee, and left her there to choke to death on her own blood, a tree branch in her clenched fist. The autopsy only detailed that she had been sexually assaulted. It's not known if she was assaulted at the location where her body was left.

What is known is that he threw her brown suede coat down to partially cover her. The tie tracks indicate that the assailant got back into his car and then backed it out of the wooded area using the same path it came in. Sharon's jeans and underwear were thrown out of the car. The underwear got caught on a tree branch. Perhaps he didn't realize he'd left his blue dress shirt behind. The size and dimensions of the shirt roughly correspond to a man's size large. or extra large. And then there's that footprint

found near the gate. The police determined it to be a men's size 8.5, which is slightly below average size, but relatively normal. The police estimated from how the print was pressed into the ground that it was likely left by a solidly built man. They estimated he weighed about 200 pounds and was six feet tall,

consistent with the description Cheryl Waugh gave to the police about the man who attacked her. But now they had to find him. In the following weeks, the police raided a Satan's Choice Motorcycle Club hangout with guns drawn in search of suspects, according to a report by Le Journale of Montreal. There were no details about whether the police were acting on a specific tip and no follow-up about any potential outcome. It appears that nothing came of that. Shortly after that, the Montreal Matan,

the tabloid that published the photo of the crime scene, published a new report asking if the police had finally got Sharon's killer. According to the article, Montreal police had arrested a 30-year-old man for attacking a male friend with a hockey stick, attempting to coerce that. that man into having sex with his own wife, and then throwing him into a basement with a shovel and telling him to dig his own grave. The man lived only a few streets away from the prior home

in The Point, so the Montreal Police referred him to the Long Gale Police for questioning specifically about Sharon's murder. They rule out any link. The media reported over the following months that four search warrants were executed in the point, but they produced nothing of value to the investigation into Sharon Pryor's murder, and more than 30 people had been detained and interrogated by investigators since the investigation began. Six of those became suspects, but that was based on gut feelings, not evidence. There were no arrests and no charges. On the first anniversary of Sharon's murder, her mother, Mrs Pryor, published an in-memorium notice in the Montreal Star.

The notice read, quote, Sharon Kim Pryor, 16 years old, died sometime between March 29th to April 1, 1975 Easter weekend. The suffering of her death, her victory she has won. She carried her cross to Calms. Her murderer will carry his heavy burden. Mum. At this time, the police confirmed that despite all their efforts, interviews, interrogations,

obtaining statements and chasing down tips and leads, they were not any closer to locating the person responsible for Sharon Pryor's murder than they were two days after her body was found. The man seems to have dropped into the area and then parachuted out without being seen. In fact, police had started to wonder if maybe more than one person was involved. The lead investigator told the Gazette that they suspected Sharon might have been carried across the snow by two people and left there for dead, but they didn't provide any details about any evidence that might have informed this new theory. All the police would say was that

at this point, they believed the most important pieces of evidence with the tire track, the footprint, and that unlocked padlock. All efforts to investigate the padlock had hit a wall so far, but police were still hopeful. The lead detective told the Gazette, If we find the guy who opened the padlock, I think we will find the guy who did this. But outside of the padlock, the only other evidence was the fresh footwork. The first footer, suggesting the man got out of his car at that gate, presumably to open it. There was no evidence that he opened the padlock. Maybe he didn't need to.

Maybe it was already unlocked for some reason. The evidence showed he opened the gate, then drove his car with its new radial tires into the field. The lead investigator stressed that the police were still in need of tips. He was quoted saying, I can't help but think there is someone who may have seen something but doesn't want to come forward. No matter how insignificant they may think their information is, it could be important to us. A year went by and the situation was exactly the same. No news, no new leads.

All the evidence was sitting in secure storage, from Sharon's clothes to the blue shirt belonging to the larger man, just waiting for a suspect to give it some context. Mrs Pryor placed another in-memorium notice in the newspaper. This one read, Sleep, my darling innocent child. The burden that is on your murderer's back will sink him lower than the grave. Alongside the police investigation, the twins, Maureen and Doreen, had become active in their own side investigation with their mother,

collecting tips, Speaking to dozens of people and forwarding anything promising onto the police, Sharon's family did not want them to forget about the case. They wanted them to keep looking until they had some answers. As more years passed with no new information, the case went cold, but the family maintained regular contact with the police. Mrs. Pryor kept Sharon's name in the newspaper through her annual memorial message, so that no one would forget, or perhaps someone's memory will be jolted.

On the fourth anniversary of Sharon's murder, the Montreal Star published a follow-up article about the case, featuring interviews with Mrs Pryor and the Twins. Sharon's bedroom was a storage room now, behind a locked door, but her old books and mini-science experiments were still there. Mrs Pryor said she accepted that the chances of capturing the killer were decreasing as each year went by, but a chance was still a chance. She still hoped that someone would remember something. Quote,

It is something the guilty one has to live with too. Maybe someday he will give himself up. She acknowledged she might be hoping for too much. When asked about her relationship with the police, Mrs. Pryor said they'd been hardworking from the very beginning, and she appreciated that they still kept in touch with her, but she did think more could have been done to investigate. For example, she mentioned the detail that Sharon and her boyfriend had been followed by a man in the two weeks prior to the murder. The boyfriend had corroborated that detail, but Mrs. Pryor didn't think that. police took the tip seriously enough. She mentioned disappointment that no sketch of that man was ever

made or details about him publicised. She said she occasionally became depressed over Sharon's murder, quote, I still hurt, I think about it often, sometimes I think it hasn't happened, but it has, it's something I live with and probably will forever. Each year on the anniversary, Mrs. Pryor putting in-memorium notices in the newspaper. Now they were accompanied by other memorial messages from those who knew Sharon. As well as remaining deeply dedicated to finding answers about what happened, Mrs. Pryor and her twin daughters, Maureen and Doreen, became advocates for other families with missing loved ones.

They were known to show up and help search for missing people and help other families navigate the system based on these. experience. But there were no new updates and no new articles until the early 2000s, more than 25 years after Sharon's murder. By 2003, there had been developments in forensic science that meant old evidence could be examined using new techniques that had not existed before. That blue T-shirt used to secure Sharon Pryor's hands behind her back, was sent for testing and a DNA profile was lifted from it. But the quantity of DNA was not sufficient to make a comparison.

More time was needed for the technology to evolve. The next year, police received a new tip that motivated immediate action. Sharon might have been taken to a garage behind a small apartment building just a couple of streets away from where she lived. More specifically, that's where she may have been held captive. The Long Gail and Montreal Police worked together to get a warrant for the garage, and the search began in July of 2003. That garage had been used as storage space by tenants of the apartment building for decades, and police were not searching the items per se, but more the floors, walls, and other stationary objects.

They were specifically looking for traces of blood or anything that might help them identify Sharon's killer. They acknowledged after 29 years it was a long shot, but they had to try. For Sharon's family, it still felt like yesterday. Her mother, Mrs. Yvonne Pryor told the press that she'd been waiting for this day. She'd never lost hope that the police would find the person responsible. The family started carrying small glass angels with them wherever they went. The angels reminded them of Sharon and gave them fresh hope that justice would be served. One of the twins, Maureen, said she wanted to look the man in the eye.

I want to know who did it. The police confirmed they didn't have a suspect that current residents of the building had all moved in since 1975 and they were not under investigation. This was about finding DNA evidence. About two dozen officers spent 15 hours emptying the garage and spraying everything with luminal solution. The following month, police announced they'd collected three DNA samples from the garage and they'd sent them off for testing to see if they could help the Sharon Pry

investigation. A spokesperson said they expected the results back in a few weeks. The following year, Mrs. Pryor told the Montreal Gazette that the DNA samples found in the garage did not match Sharon. Another dead end. That was 2004. Eight years passed after that with no updates. As each new investigator had taken retirement, the call. The call cold case was passed to another one. In 2012, 37 years after Sharon was murdered, police announced that an anonymous donor had stepped forward

to offer a $10,000 reward for information. To help bring in fresh tips, police set up a command post in the point and dedicated phone line, encouraging the public to come forward with any information they might have. even if they didn't know it would help. Even the smallest detail could help solve the case.

The police just needed those tips. Mrs. Pryor told the National Post that she wished the police could share the evidence they have from Sharon's case. She felt that she might see or pick up something that might have been missed or overlooked, but it just wasn't possible. She said she was 37 years old when Sharon was. murdered, and she was now 74 years old and still waiting for the case to be solved. She said that she still ran a Facebook page and a website dedicated to finding Sharon's killer,

which also included links to other unsolved murder cases across Canada. And those cases took up most of her time these days, as she reached out to parents of other missing and murdered children to see how she could help and spent hours online looking for connections and other opportunities to raise awareness. Doreen, one of the twins, said she hoped the case was solved in her mom's lifetime. A few years later, evidence from Sharon's case was sent to Quebec's legal science laboratory for a fresh analysis because forensic DNA technology had advanced significantly. This time, the lab managed to lift a complete DNA profile from that blue shirt.

It belonged to a man, and the same profile was also found on two items of Sharon's clothing, her underwear and her jeans. The profile was run through the National DNA Databank, where it was compared to profiles collected from convicted offenders in Canada. No matches came up. This means that in the previous 15 years or so since the National DNA Data Bank was established, the person who murdered Sharon Pryor had not been convicted of a serious crime. In Canada, anyway.

By 2021, there had been 13 lead investigators on the Sharon Pryor case, and another one had just taken the baton. When Detective Sergeant Eric Rassicoe took the lead, he was determined to use advancements in DNA technology to solve the case. The Quebec Legal Science Laboratory suggested a new technique, genetic genealogy, which combines DNA testing with old-fashioned family tree research. It's a new option for cold cases that have preserved DNA from a crime scene that doesn't match anyone. in the criminal database and no other suspect has been identified. Here's how genetic genealogy works. The mystery DNA profile is compared to DNA profiles on public genealogy databases,

the same kind that people use to learn about their ancestry. An exact match is not needed. The perpetrator themselves doesn't need to have their profile on the public database. But if one of their relatives has, a partial DNA match might be possible that they can narrow down. In recent years, genetic genealogy has been used to solve several high-profile cases, including the identification of the Golden State Killer, a prolific serial killer and rapist who evaded investigators in the United States for decades. This process led to the identification and arrest of the person.

perpetrator Joseph James DeAngelo Jr., himself a former police officer. Genetic genealogy was also used to identify Calvin Hoover, who murdered 9-year-old Christine Jessop in 1984, a case we covered on this podcast last year. These two cases were solved by tracing both sides of the family tree, but for the Sharon Pryor case, a slightly different technique was used. used. Examination of the Y chromosome, which is passed down through male ancestry lines, from grandfather to father to son. This means that men who share the same paternal ancestry will have very similar Y chromosome profiles, perhaps even identical. If one of the

perpetrators' male relatives were represented in the database, it could point investigators toward the family the perpetrator came from. So the Y chromosome found in the DNA evidence from Sharon's genes and the men's blue shirt was compared with DNA profiles in the public database. And sure enough, there was a partial match, a DNA profile from a person who belonged to the same paternal family line as the perpetrator.

And that family surname was roeating. Detective Sergeant Roussakow couldn't recall seeing that surname in any of the case materials. He reviewed the notes again to make sure. Sure enough, no one with the surname Romein was associated with the investigation into the murder of Sharon Pryor. Now to identify and narrow down the suspect pool using family tree research and old-fashioned investigative techniques. Genealogists at the lab began reconstructing the Romine family tree using public records like births, deaths and marriages, as well as social media profiles,

clearing each applicable relative individually. At the same time, police worked from another angle looking for men with that surname who might have been living in Montreal in 1975. Eventually, those two lines of... of investigation narrowed down to a handful of people, then two, then one man. His name was Franklin Maywood Romine. He was American, born in West Virginia. That explains why he was a native English speaker. He often went by the name Butch, and he did live in Quebec during

the 1970s in two different addresses. One was in long-game. One was in long-game. the same city across the St. Lawrence River with the beekeeping apiary where Sharon Pryor's body was found. And at the exact time she was murdered in the point, Franklin Romine was also living in Montreal, so that checked out. But what about the other details? The evidence from the beekeeping field where Sharon's body was located

suggested the perpetrator was tall and solidly built. The only other possible details were from Cheryl Waugh, the woman they believed he attacked minutes before he encountered Sharon Pryor. Franklin Romine would have been 29 years old at the time, which was also consistent with Cheryl Waugh's description of her attacker. Photographs of Romine showed a strong physical resemblance. was tall and athletically built with curly brown hair and a neatly trimmed mustache that extended down to the corners of his mouth. Franklin Romine seemed like a great lead, so detectives did a deep

dive into him by looking into Canadian and American records to see if there were any other details that matched. They learned he was born in 1946 in West Virginia and he had seven siblings including three brothers. In the years before Sharon Pryor's murder in 1975, Romine had built up an extensive criminal record in both the United States and in Canada. The news archives have some details of quite a few of those crimes, but not all of them.

In 1963, a newspaper from Richmond, Indiana, published a report that police had stopped three teenage boys, boys in a car who claimed they were driving to Illinois to look for work. 16-year-old Franklin Maywood Romine and another youth were charged with permitting the driver to operate the motor vehicle without a license. They were both fined $5. There was no word on what happened with the actual driver. As an adult, Franklin Romine was known to do labor work and was unemployed for extended periods of time. At one point, he worked as a truck driver and one of his routes took him into Canada. Within the next three years, Franklin Romine

was convicted of grand larceny and sentenced to serve one to 10 years of hard labor. The Rayleigh record reported in 1967 that the now 20-year-old had escaped from the West Virginia penitentiary coal mine. According to the following day's update, he was only out for about four hours when prison guards spotted him walking along the highway and recaptured him. By 1969, Franklin Romine was out of prison and had found his way to Ottawa, getting in trouble again. The Ottawa Journal reported that he was one of three men who had pleaded guilty to breaking and entering an Ottawa laundromat and busting open the washing machine coin containers. Their efforts netted them $21 in coins, but they caused an estimated $600 damage to the machines.

Romine was sentenced to two six-month terms of hard agricultural labor at the Birch Industrial Farm, a facility that was located near Brantford, Ontario, on land that has now been trained. transferred back to a large First Nations Reserve, the six nations of the Grand River. The Brantford Expositor reported that Franklin Romine had only been at the facility for one day before he escaped. He made it up to Montreal by the time police caught up with him, and he was sentenced to another six months for escaping custody. That was 1970, five years before Sharon Purs. Pryor's murder. By 1974, Romine was back in West Virginia, and his criminal appetite had apparently

taken a turn. Most mornings, he got coffee from a particular coffee shop, from a particular waitress, a 23-year-old single mother. One night, she woke up to find him on top of her in her bed. He'd figured out where she lived and had broken a window to get into her apartment while she was sleeping. He then found her in bed and pinned her down, holding her arms. He told her that he wanted her since he first saw her, and he had decided he was going to have her, even if he had to kill her. She was terrified, not only for herself, but for her four-year-old son asleep in the next room. She struggled against Romine until she suddenly heard her son's voice in the bedroom. The commotion had woken him up. She frantically told him everything was fine and sent

him back to bed. Her body's trauma response had kicked in. Her brain flooded with adrenaline to help her survive this life-threatening situation. She was cornered and overpowered by a man who seemed determined to get what he wanted and threatened to kill her. Resisting him might make things worse, and he now knew her son was just meters away. Surviving this situation meant doing whatever was needed to get this man out of the apartment without killing her or hurting her son. She went limp and froze, accepting that she could not stop what was happening, and to protect her son, she had to survive a rape. And that's exactly what Franklin Romine did. When he found, he finished, he threw a $20 bill down and left the apartment. The woman called the police immediately

and told them what her customer from the coffee shop, Franklin Romine, had done. The police soon caught up with him, but two months later, he was released after agreeing to a $2,500 peace bond. Once again, he fled to Canada. Now he was a wanted man. and the FBI were actively looking for him. During this time, he lived in the Montreal area, where he was somehow able to purchase a car with new radial tires from a woman who lived only two blocks away from Sharon Pryor's home. The make and model of the car was one of the 37 models

that could have left those tire marks in the beekeeping field in Long Gale, where Sharon's body was dumped. Franklin Romine had of course lived in Long Gale before. That was one of his two addresses in the Montreal area. Police believe that's how he gained knowledge of the area and its isolated fields that house beekeeping apiaries, although no further details were released about that. The padlock on the gate remained a mystery. But that footprint found next to it, investigators determined

it was a match to Franklin Romine's shoe size. They also learned that in 1975, Franklin Romine was living in the Montreal neighborhood of Hampstead, located just 10 kilometers from the point, on the other side of the railway tracks and the Lachine Canal. It was March 29th of that year when 23-year-old Cheryl Waugh was violently attacked by a man on the street,

matching Romine's description just down the street from Marina's pizzeria, followed by the disappearance of 16-year-old Sharon Pryor shortly afterwards. Franklin Romine stayed in Montreal as investigators got to work and the case blew up, making national headlines as it became one of the most high-profile unsolved murders in the country. Seven months later, in October of 1975, Romine decided it was time to head back to the States, not knowing that the FBI had briefed Canadian border officials about his case. They captured him at the border and turned him over, where he was extradited back to West Virginia to face trial for breaking and entering and rape.

He was convicted and sentenced to murder. more than 20 years in prison, but he appealed, claiming the judge made a mistake when instructing the jury. His conviction was overturned and a new trial was ordered. In 1981, Franklin Romine accepted a plea deal and pled guilty to second-degree sexual assault. He was sentenced to five to ten years in prison. By this point, several years had passed, and because he was given credit for time served as he waited, he soon finished his sentence. He returned to Montreal,

where police were still trying to identify the man who had murdered Sharon Pryor six years earlier, possibly the same tall man with curly brown hair who had attacked Cheryl Wa. But he stayed under the radar. In August of the following year, 1982, Franklin Maywood Romine died suddenly at the age of 36 at Verdun Hospital, just two kilometres from the street where Sharon had lived. What exactly happened to him is still a bit of a mystery. When investigators narrowed in on him years later after the DNA profile,

very little information was available about the circumstances or cause of his death, only that it was violent. By this point, Franklin Romine fit almost every part of the picture investigators had been trying to put together for decades. His age and appearance fit Cheryl Wa's description. He was an English-speaking American living in Montreal at the time with previous ties to Long Gale. His shoe size matched the footprint at the gate

and he drove a car at the time that was compatible with the tire tracks found at the scene. The blue men's shirt used to restrain Sharon Pryor's hands behind her back would have fit him perfectly. He also had a history of violent sexual offending. In addition to his conviction for breaking in and raping the waitress, investigators learned of at least three other women who complained that Romine had sexually assaulted them in. as well. Now, police had to confirm the match by comparing Franklin Romine's DNA to the DNA profile

lifted from the blue shirt, Sharon Pryor's underwear and her jeans. The problem was 48 years had passed since Sharon's murder and Franklin Romine had been dead for 41 of those. They didn't have his DNA. Investigators learned that Franklin Romine's body was buried in Putnam County, West Virginia, so that's where his family must be. Longgale police reached out to the authorities there, and the two agencies began working together to locate any living relatives. Because the DNA analysis had been based on the Y chromosome, they only needed to focus on male relatives in his paternal line. Fortunately, two of his brothers were still alive, and neither of them seemed particularly

shocked by what the police were telling them. They said that their brother had always been a violent man. In fact, when one of those brothers was off serving with the Marines, Franklin tried to rape his wife. That was the end of their relationship. The brothers also told the police that Franklin's voice, that Franklin's voice, he was a woman. violent death was a mystery to his family as well. They'd asked for an investigation into it, but nothing ever happened. The only information they had was a belief that Franklin's death

was related to organized crime in Montreal. Most importantly for the Sharon Pryor case, both brothers agreed to provide DNA samples to compare against the unknown DNA profile. It was determined, that it was 140 million times more likely that the DNA belonged to their brother over any other person in the Caucasian population. Police were one step closer, but this still did not prove Franklin Romine was Sharon's killer. Police asked his surviving brothers and sisters for permission to exhume his body so they could take a sample and compare it directly with the DNA profile. But the family said no. They cited religious beliefs and also mentioned that because Franklin had been buried directly beside their mother, they were worried that her remains could also be

disturbed. The police in Putnam County filed a petition, asking for permission to exhume the body anyway. Franklin Romine's brothers fought the application, arguing that the DNA samples that had already provided should have been enough to give Sharon's family the answer they'd been waiting for. They were also willing to state that they believed their brother was guilty of the crime. At a special hearing to decide the outcome, Detective Sergeant Eric Rassico testified that this wasn't enough. They were not trying to cause further pain for the Romine family. They were just trying to ease the pain of the Pryor family who'd been waiting for answers for almost 50 years. Sharon's mother, Mrs. Yvonne Pryor, was still alive. She was now in her mid-80s and she'd spent

five decades focused on advancing the investigation. The judge heard about all the corroborating circumstantial evidence linking Franklin Romine to the crimes in Montreal, including. including the account of Cheryl Waugh, who was attacked by a man assumed to be him just minutes before Sharon Pryor was. Sharon's mother deserved to know once and for all who killed her daughter, and the only way to confirm it 100%

was through direct DNA comparison. They had to exhume Franklin Romine's body. The judge agreed. In early May of 2000, Long Gail Police met at the cemetery in West Virginia with members of the FBI, West Virginia State Police and Putnam County Sheriff's Office to begin the exhumation. The DNA was extracted and samples were sent off to create a DNA profile of Franklin Romine to compare against the evidence.

A few weeks later, they got the results back. It was a confirmed 100% match. Quebec media outlet Nouveau were there when police informed Sharon's family and captured their reactions which were included in CTV's W5 series on this case. Mrs Pryor looked stunned. Sharon's twin sisters, Maureen and Doreen, burst into tears of relief. It was described as a very emotional meeting. Longgale police held a press conference to announce that almost 50 years after Sharon Pryor walked out of her home that Saturday night,

they could finally announce who was responsible for abducting her, holding her captive, sexually assaulting her, murdering her and dumping her body. Franklin, Maywood, Romine For all those years, his name had never appeared anywhere in the case file. Police had never identified him as a suspect and never had any reason to connect him to Sharon. The public heard that Franklin Romine died just seven years after her murder, taking whatever he knew about that night with him. At the press conference, police also paid tribute to Sharon's family, who had spent decades refusing to let her case or her memory fade away.

Their persistence helped keep the investigation alive long enough for forensic science to finally catch up with it. Sharon's younger twin sisters closed out the press conference on behalf of the Pryor family, with their mother looking on from the front row, elderly and frail. Mrs Pryor would later tell media outlet Nouveau that her days of fronting the media were long behind her. Taking turns to speak, Maureen and Doreen acknowledge that nothing could bring Sharon back,

but knowing that her killer is no longer alive and can no longer hurt anyone else, brings them to somewhat of a closure for a long chapter of their lives. They thanked the detectives for their dedication and the fact that they never gave up on the case. Then they paid tribute to their older sister. Sharon is here beside us. She was a beautiful young lady with a heart of gold. Sharon excelled all that she did, be it at school or in sport. She was kind to every living creature and had hoped to become a veterinarian.

Sharon was loved and respected by all who knew her, especially in Pointe St. Charles. The sisters said that the previous 48 years had not been easy, but Sharon gave them strength to get through every day, and they had a final emotional message for her. Lastly, to Sharon, our angel, thank you for being our daughter and big sister. We'll always be your mom, your little brother and sisters who sat looking out that window that Easter weekend, hoping to see you walking on home. You may never have come back to our house that weekend,

but you have never left our hearts, and you never will. We love you, Sharon, now. May you truly rest in peace. After identifying Franklin Romine as the man responsible for Sharon's murder, Long Gail Police began working with other Canadian law enforcement agencies in the FBI to see whether his DNA could be connected to any other unsolved crimes. His profile was entered into CODIS in the United States, and investigators began checking whether he could be linked to other cases in either country.

So far, there has been no public announcement of any additional matches. But the breakthrough in Sharon's case showed police in Quebec just how much new forensic technology could offer to cases that had been sitting for decades unsolved. In 2025, Montreal Police announced the creation of a dedicated cold case unit, with 16 investigators working full-time on nearly 800 unsolved murders dating back to the 1970s. They're focusing first on the cases with the best chance of being solved, whether it's because forensic evidence has been preserved and can now be retested, or because witnesses were still alive.

Sharon Pryor's case showed just how important these efforts can be. The answer had been there all along, sitting in the evidence for decades because the technology needed to analyze it didn't exist. But time doesn't erase the truth. Sharon's family had to wait nearly 50 years for the science to catch up, but the answers they finally received gave many other families of unsolved cases renewed hope. that they might get answers one day too. Thanks for listening.

We send our deepest condolences to Sharon Pryor's family and we acknowledge the strength they've carried for so many years. If you happen to know anyone related to this case, please respect their privacy. This episode has been pieced together from the news archives, including the daily reporting of the Montreal Star, the Montreal Gazette, and interviews with the family by Nouveau.

and CTV's W5 program. We did find some conflicting details across the public record, mainly around small details like dates, times, measurements, and the rough sequence of events. Where possible, we've relied on the family's website, Sharon Pryor.com, or what family members themselves have confirmed in interviews, and otherwise on the details reported most consistently.

For the full list of resources and anything else you want to know about, the podcast, visit canadian truecrime.ca.ca and follow us on our Facebook and Instagram pages to see photos and clippings. Canadian True Crime donates monthly to those facing injustice. This month we have donated to a Quebec victim support organization mentioned several times in the reporting for Sharon Pryor's case. The Association for Families of Persons assassinated or disappeared, or AFPA, offers resources and tools to victims and families to help them rebuild their lives. Learn more at afpad.ca.ca. Audio editing was by Crosby Audio and Eric Crosby voiced the disclaimer.

Research was by Haley Gray and our senior producer is Lindsay Eldridge. Additional research, writing, narration and sound design was by me and the theme songs were composed by We Talk of Dreams. I'll be back soon with another Canadian true crime episode. See you then.