Front Burner - Cold calls from one of the most horrific serial killers in Canadian history

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

What does a reporter do when they receive a cold call from one of the most horrific serial killers in Canadian history?The killer: Clifford Olson, who murdered at least eleven children in the 1980s. The reporter: Arlene Bynon, who recorded her jailhouse calls with Olson for years. Alongside legendary journalist Peter Worthington, Arlene spent hundreds of hours on the phone with Olson. It was kept secret from his prison guards; he wasn't allowed to speak to the media.In Calls From a Killer, from CBC’s Uncover, Arlene unearths secrets that have been buried for decades. More episodes of Calls from a Killer are available at: https://link.mgln.ai/1rPEb1

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Hey everyone, I'm Ali Jains. I'm a producer on Frontburner and we have a special episode for you today from Calls from a Killer, the brand new season of CBC's Uncover. What does a young female reporter do when she receives a cold call from one of the most horrific serial killers in Canadian history? The killer Clifford Olsen, who murdered 11 children in the 1980s. Maybe more. And the reporter?

That was Arlene Bynum, a journalist and broadcaster, and the host of Calls from a Killer. Alongside legendary journalist Peter Worthington, Arlene spent hundreds of hours on the phone with Olsen. It was kept secret from his prison guards since he wasn't allowed to speak to the media. In Calls from a Killer, Arlene revisits the tapes and unearthed secrets that have been buried for decades.

Now here's the first episode of Calls from a Killer from CBC's Uncover. Have a listen. The following episode contains strong language and descriptions of violence. Please take care when listening. Whenever I stayed at my grandparents' house as a kid, there was a rule. Always pick up the phone. Because you never knew who could be calling for my grandpa Pete.

A Soviet spy, a cabinet minister, a serial killer. Growing up, I'd learn what my grandpa did for a living through the stories he'd share at the holidays or summers at the lake. It wasn't that he was bragging. Pete was actually really humble. He just had stories no one else could tell. And he never told the same one twice. Because he never needed to.

There was the time he stood just feet away from Lee Harvey Oswald as Jack Ruby pulled the trigger. The time a bullet went through his sleeve in Algiers as fighting between the Algerians and French raged. The time he met the Beatles in Hong Kong. He didn't even think to mention that one until a couple years before he died. Long story short, he thought they all needed haircuts. My grandpa, Peter Worthington, was a newspaper man, and for some time he was one of the newspaper men in Toronto. He was a roving foreign correspondent chasing every conflict through the 50s and 60s until helping found his own paper. The Toronto Sun, a paper that still exists today.

Pete continued to write until his death in 2013. The last thing he wrote was his own obituary. My grandpa left behind a bird's nest of papers, photos, and tapes, fragments of his extraordinary career. It was all packed and sent away to Canada's National Archives by my grandmother, Yvonne. But six years after Pete's death, I brought those boxes back. By this time, I was in my mid-20s trying to make it as a screenwriter in LA, trying to

find my next story. What if it lived in the boxes that Pete had left behind? I popped one of his hundreds of cassettes into a player. Tape 12, 1991. Okay. Hello, Peter? Yeah. I called last night there and I can appreciate not calling you at home, but I thought sometimes for an emergency or anything that comes up, Peter, you know?

Doesn't bother me, but you know, keep peace in the home. This man hoping to keep the peace at home, is my grandpa Pete. Yeah, I know definitely. I mean, that comes first, you know, but I thought like if anything of an emergency ever come up, and one would have to give... The only emergency that would come up would be you going over the wall. Well, or I'd kill somebody. On the other end of the phone call is a man named Clifford Olson, a man convicted in 1982

of killing 11 children and teenagers. The oldest of them, 18. The youngest of them, 9. Pete's archives housed hundreds of hours of calls with Olson. They began in 1990 and they went on for years and they were placed by Olson from prison. Now what I'm saying is, oh Jesus, you got some drill going, can you hear it?

Yeah, what's that, a fire? Drill, you know, they're fixing the cells. Oh yeah. You still can hear me though. There was an unsettling amount of polite small talk. I could hear my grandfather patiently humoring Olsen. Certainly, and I wrote John Christian a nasty letter that goes out today, and I told him he better answer his letter.

Who's Christian? Christian. Oh, Christian, yeah. Jean Chrétien. Olsen was writing the Prime Minister. Oh, he didn't answer a reply to the letter that I sent him, blah, blah, blah, blah. Oh, yeah. You know? But once in a while, you'd be reminded who's on the line.

I was drinking, but yet I knew what I was doing at all times. Yet I didn't give a fuck. I knew deliberately that I was going to go out day after day, year after year, pick these persons up, have sex with them, then kill them, you follow me? Yeah. And then destroy it of all evidence. But Pete wasn't recording these tapes alone. It became clear he had a partner.

And she was where it all started. Okay, so Peter's here now so we can both talk. Oh, hello Peter. Hello Peter. He must be going for a coffee. No, he's here. No, no, I just got back. Okay. We're all playing music. What I said about the Freedom of Information Act? Yeah, I

didn't tell him that. You want to repeat it? Well, no, I just wanted short. I accessed my stuff from the US Department of Justice. She was a journalist herself. CHFI radio. Clifford Olsen's calling. We accept charge. Yes, I will. Thank you. Although Olsen often didn't treat her like one. Thank you, operator. That should have been Senator Clifford Olsen. Senator are you now?

Yeah, right. How are you? Where did you have to go? I had to go to the doctors. No. Mm-hmm. Not pregnant. No. Oh, okay. Hey, I hope we don't play this on, you know, during your interview.

No, I will edit that part out. From what I could hear, she was also patient with Olson. But then, there was this exchange. And during this two and a half years, you have never got angry at Peter, but you get angry at me. I mean, you and I have had arguments. You've hung up on me but you get angry at me. I mean you and I have had arguments, you've hung up on me, you you've yelled at me, you've said very nasty things about me behind my back and then on the other hand... Tell me one nasty thing I said about your back. You've called me a bitch. Yes, yeah I have

and I think I called you that on the phone too. And I don't think I am a bitch. I think that I'm just very clear, that's all. You have not come in to interview me. I don't think that is a proper perspective for a reporter. Now, you might have reasons for that. You may be scared of a serial killer. What am I going to do, hold you up against the wall with a pencil?

I'm asking you, why haven't you come in with Peter to visit? You think it's because I'm frightened? I'm telling you, why haven't you come in with Peter to visit? You think it's because I'm frightened? I'm telling you Arlene, yes I do. Are you? Not frightened, no. I paused the tape and scribbled on a post-it. Find Arlene. This is Calls from a Killer from CBC's Uncover. I'm Nathaniel Frum.

And I'm Arlene Bynum. This is Episode 1 about 35 years ago. for the murder of two Florida coeds and a 12-year-old girl. This is me about 35 years ago. I was hosting one of Toronto's most popular afternoon radio news programs. I got to do it all on this job. Reporting hard news, producing documentaries, interviewing celebrities and politicians. But this week in 1989, I took listeners deep into the case of Ted Bundy. On Chronicle this week, we dedicated an entire program to try and find out why

this killer became an enigma of U.S. criminal justice. It was about 10 years after his trial, but the story still fascinated me. Ted Bundy was certainly not the typical killer most of us have in our minds, and this charm explains his celebrity, even in death. It also explains how he lured a bevy of unsuspecting young girls to their graves. I saw myself in his victims, and I was desperate to learn what could make ordinary men monsters. In Bundy's case, there was a journalist who'd been able to ask the question to Bundy himself. I'd like to welcome to Chronicle Stephen Michaud.

Good afternoon. Good afternoon, Arlene. How are you today? I'm wondering how you are today. Stephen Michaud had been granted extensive access to Bundy over months. He was able to extract information from Bundy that police never were. His interviews led to some of the only insight the public really had into Bundy's crimes. Into this new kind of killer.

I remember working on the story and interviewing you many years ago and learning the lesson that the person that I thought was lurking in the shadows for me may have a nice suit on and may be handsome. I learned that lesson. Do you think anybody else did? Well, we've gotten a lot of mail from women who have said, you know, thank you for writing that book the way you did. And yes, my life has been changed as a result of knowing about Ted Bundy.

But I certainly, I don't think that we as a society have learned any enduring lessons from Ted Bundy, either how to identify future Ted Bundys who are out there right now, I'm sure, as was Ted. He was certain that he was not only not alone, but that there were a lot of killers out there right now, I'm sure, as was Ted. He was certain that he was not only not alone, but that there were a lot of killers out there who were far more successful than he. By this time, serial killers had become sort of a beat for me.

I interviewed experts, I learned what I could of the research that existed back then, and it all led to me being interviewed about Bundy on national TV. What I didn't know then was that the show was playing on a TV in Kingston Penitentiary, a maximum security prison home to Canada's most notorious criminals. Soon after the show aired, I got a letter. It was really a taunt. It read, I have a story to tell.

I saw you on TV talking about Ted Bundy. I think if you want to know about the mind of a serial killer, you should talk to a real serial killer. It was signed. Clifford Robert Olson. Nearly a decade earlier, Olson was one of the first to get the label of serial killer in Canada. From the end of 1980 to the summer of 1981,

Olson had abducted, raped, and killed 11 young people in the province of British Columbia. From May to August, the families had to face the grim news their sons and daughters had been murdered, stabbed repeatedly or beaten to death. As news broke of his crimes, Canadians grappled with the graphic details, with the violence he inflicted against children. All were nude. They are both male and female, picked up while walking, hitchhiking, waiting for a bus or looking for a job. Until recently, there was still hope some would be found alive. I didn't respond to Olson's letter right away.

I'd done enough reporting on psychopathic killers to know it would only feed his ego. And I didn't want to give him that. This man had murdered children. And now he was reaching out to me from prison. But the case of Clifford Olson stayed with me. A case that I knew there was more to. Because ten years after his arrest, there were still so many questions left unanswered. What drove him to kill?

Could he have been stopped? And what dark secrets did he still carry? So a week later, I wrote back to Olson. What is your story? On the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz comes an unprecedented exhibition about one of history's darkest moments. Auschwitz, not long ago, not far away, features more than 500 original objects, firsthand accounts, and survivor testimonies that tell the powerful story

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represent a condo corporation, or own a cleaning company, we make insurance easy to understand so you can focus on the big stuff, like your small business. Get insurance that's really big on care. Find an agent today at Desjardins.com slash business coverage. Clerk call for Eileen Bynum. Yes. From Clifford Olsen, will you accept the charge? Yes, I will. Hello. Hi. I was stunned when I got that first call. It was about a month after I responded to Olsen's letter, but I knew he was only allowed to talk to his lawyers from prison, not the media.

Okay, listen, just don't let anything out that I'm calling you or we'll cut right off. to talk to his lawyers from prison, not the media. Yeah. Okay, listen, just don't let anything out that I'm calling you or we'll cut right off. Yeah, I'm not, no. Oh, you get what I'm getting at? I'm not doing a story this week on or anything. No, but I'm saying that way we're okay. Are you supposed to call the media? You are obviously allowed telephone calls.

Yeah, this is a conference call going through to my lawyer, which you're at his office, Arlene. You're the first interview I ever gave in the media. For whatever reason, Olsen had chosen me. And from the start I knew I wanted to understand why he did what he did. What I don't understand is, who did you hate? Did you hate women? No.

Because it seemed like you might have hated women. I know we talked about sort of living with yourself. We all have to live with ourselves and realize what we've done and come to grips with it. Does it help that part of you as well to talk about it? Well, really, I see, if you're being a Christian, I'm forgiven in the sense that it's over and done with and I'm not to whine and cry at what happened. But still being human, I have those inner thoughts and feelings that, Jesus, how could me of anybody in North America commit such things. As I listen to these tapes, I feel right there, back in the moment.

I'm young, in my mid-twenties, and hungry, brimming with confidence. Thinking if I could just ask the right questions the right way, I would understand what made him the way he was. Over time, I would learn a lot about him. What did the psychiatrist call you? They say that I'm normal. That's it?

They say you're normal. Yep. What psychiatrists actually found was that Olsen was a severe psychopath. One doctor put it this way, even people who have met individuals who are called psychopathic or antisocial cannot bring themselves to believe that there may be individuals of this gross nature. It's too impossible to accept. Well do I sound like a highly organized psychopath to you my godlady Go ahead. I don't know. I mean I don't I'm not a

psychiatrist Go ahead. You're a reporter. I'm a reporter As a reporter these calls were about more than learning about Olson himself I hoped I could do something that the police couldn't. I hoped I could get more information out of him. Because like many families in the BC area where he prowled, I believe there were more than 11 victims. The authorities had long closed the case. They wanted it shut. Olsen was serving 11 concurrent life sentences, one for each murder he confessed to. But I knew the parents were still waiting to know for certain, to lay their kids to rest in a way that brought peace and closure. And if

there was a chance I could find something new I had to try, no matter how Olsen tried to play games and spin lines. piece in the sense that it still bothers me today. Certainly I wouldn't be human of it, didn't it? It will bother me till the day of my death. But you've got to put things in the past and you've got to look to the future along the line somewhere. If I wanted to continue these calls I had to keep them secret. But I did confide in someone, a friend and mentor who wanted to help. I've asked Peter Worthington to join us today and he's here. Oh, okay. And he's talking with us on the line. I think all three of us can talk. Hello, Peter. Yeah, hi, Clifford. How are you doing? Not bad.

Peter Worthington is of course Nat's grandpa, Pete. I just ramble on here, you know, and she just listens and you know, she, ha-hum, yes, yes, yes. I never give her a chance to get anything in sideways. Yeah, well, I have the same problem. However I had explained it to myself, I knew that what I was doing, when it eventually came out, would be met with criticism. Olsen had been banned from talking to the media by a gag order, imposed after he'd sent letters detailing his crimes to the families of the victims. I'd be accused of giving him a platform and the attention he desperately craved.

So I wanted cover. And legendary journalist Peter Worthington, he would do. You know, I think the big question is why you did it and the story behind the thing. There was never a trial, so nobody knows. Without going into details, what are the reasons? Why? Right, I've got them. I know why. I answered that myself in my own thing. But I've got to have somebody to write. I'm not asking for money.

There are parts of Olsen's story he wouldn't tell us on these early comps. Okay, we have to give up the studio now. Okay, and it was good talking to you, Peter. Okay, good talking to you, Clifford. Okay, and you guys get things going, eh? Okay, though. Okay, and I'll see you at a trouble. Okay.

But soon, Olsen was calling us weekly. Hi, how are you? I. Hi, how are you? I'm fine, how are you? About 10 minutes late, I called the bottom number. It started to feel, well, not normal, but certainly routine. Sometimes he would call me just to tell me about what he was watching. Got a movie on it, it's a comedy movie on baseball. Or to pretend he was a radio DJ.

Coming live all the way from the Kingston penitentiary, your local DJ, Clifford Robert Olson, in stereo. These records and these tapes are all dedicated to Arlene. He would call me at work or at home. He called me on Christmas. He knew no boundaries. Well, where's Arlene today? She's not at work yet.

Oh, well, let's see what time is. Oh, no, no, she won't be at work. She won't be at work for an hour. Well, she's Arlene today? She's not at work yet. Oh, well, let's see what time is she... Oh, no, no, she won't be at work. She won't be at work for an hour. Well, she's not at home. Well, she's probably on the way then. Well, I called her just ten minutes ago and she wasn't in the car phone. Oh, well, God knows. Okay, listen, can you get a little message for her? Yeah.

It was like we were lying in wait, waiting for Olsen to tell us what we really wanted to know. For the first year, Peter and I made requests to see Olsen in prison, but were turned down. But we felt we needed to see him in person, so we found another way in. We told prison officials we were writing a book about Olsen, And if we couldn't talk to him, could we just get a tour of where he was being held? It worked. On February 19th, 1991, Peter and I drove the three hours from Toronto

to visit Olson in prison. As we approached, I looked up at the imposing walls of Kingston Penitentiary. Inside were some of the most violent men in the country. I was nervous. Peter could tell that I was worried and told me I was right to be unnerved,

a young woman entering a maximum security men's prison. But this was my choice. I knew I needed to see him at least once, inside the prison walls he was calling me from. And then, almost immediately, as Peter and I stepped into the foyer of the penitentiary, there was Olsen. He had guards on either side of him, hands cuffed, being walked back to his cell after a haircut.

He looked up and saw me. We locked eyes. He had no idea we were coming. Olsen stopped and stared at us as he was taken back to his cell, and then he turned and winked at me. Peter and I continued our interview with the warden without skipping a beat. We couldn't let on that Olsen knew us. Before we left I asked, could I just walk down the middle of the cell block where he was being held? The warden agreed. Peter stayed behind and I started walking. I could feel eyes on me, watching me as I passed.

And then I got to Olsen cell. Richard was waiting with a locked back and he was hanging with two arms through the bars. Peter and I weren't allowed to record inside the prison, but we started as soon as we began driving away. And then we just stood and looked at each other, and he said, and your name? And then I didn't answer. I stood there looking at him, and he said, and your name? And then I went, Arlene Byner.

He went, I'm so pleased to meet you. I said, you and the gentleman look good in person. It was the only time I ever saw Olson in person, and I could easily imagine him being a killer. I've never forgotten him looking at me from his cell, hands high up on the bars. His face was in darkness, but backlit from the light coming in from the tiny window to the rear. He was calm until he wasn't. As I walked away, he started calling my name. Arlene. Arlene.

A nearby prisoner yelled, It's Clifford's girlfriend. The angry warden pulled me away as the men yelled from their cells, trying to get us out of the area as fast as possible, as catcalls echoed off the thick concrete walls. It was chaos. It's been more than three decades since that moment, and it still horrifies me. In the years that followed, I would report what I could

from what Olson told me, until eventually I wasn't able to listen to him any longer. Yeah. It's just many times in a lot of the psychiatric stuff that I've read and been looking at even connected with other serial killers there's been some sort of trauma in somebody's childhood and even one that they won't even admit and sometimes that they forget. I question a lot of that too. I think a lot of that is bullshit Arlene. I think a lot of those people are not

sexually abused to use as an escape goat to get out for what they're doing. You know, a lot of people just lie. You know, I mean, they've got to cover themselves. They're saving face. They've got to save a little pride, you know? Yeah. But there's got to be a reason why you ended up doing what you did. And it's not as simple as drinking because what you did isn't as simple as what other

people do when they drink. Peter would continue speaking to him long after I stopped, over a decade more, and he would write books and articles about his relationship with Olsen. Somehow I never could, but still I kept everything. The dozens, maybe hundreds of letters Olsen sent me. The interrogation transcripts and psychiatric reports. The horrific journals where Olson detailed his crimes. And the tapes. The recordings of our hundreds of calls. It all lived in boxes that I carried with me from house to house wherever I moved. I think I always knew someday I'd return to this story. carried with me from house to house wherever I moved. I think I always knew someday I'd return to this story.

After Peter's death, I thought I would have to do it alone until a message in 2019. Nat, I still remember when I got that message from you. And I don't think you had any idea at what time you were messaging me. You didn't know I'd yanked up the boxes. And I had, and there was this message from Peter's grandson. It was a moment. Yeah, no, I had no idea you had dug up the boxes. I don't think when I first reached out to you that I understood how deep this story went, not just with you but with

the nation. In the years we've worked together since, I've started to realize how important it is that this story is told. And for me, for you to send me the message, it was just so full circle on the story, you know, and as you know, I was very clear with you. This thing has been twisting and turning inside me for such a long time. And this whole return to the partnership I had with your granddad, I was about your age and he was about my age.

And he's not here anymore and here we are, and both of us, picking up this story again. I feel the ghost of Peter in this. It feels appropriate that we've teamed up and all these years later, you walking me through this story, you being the vet and me being the rookie. In an era where most serial killer stories are known and most murderers are famous. Why isn't this one well known? Why, you know, when I was reading about it, every detail was stunning to me. And do you think this story was suppressed or is there another reason why it wasn't well known? I do, and that's one of the things that sticks out at me.

But I also remember when everyone knew the name Clifford Wilson, and when you said it, you could see their face twist. It was a name that was completely connected with evil in this country. But yet now when I look at it, it is incredible that that cash for bodies deal happened happened and that we forgot about it. There's no shortage of serial killer content out there. Documentaries on streaming services, TV shows, movies, fiction thrillers that sit on bestseller lists for weeks. But in Clifford Olsen's case, there was no long winding twist-filled road to catching

him. Because for a long time, police didn't know there was a him to catch. Until Olson told them. Until he was able to get something in return. See, we closed the deal. Here, we closed the deal, I think it was the 25th, about 12 o'clock. Olson proposed a deal. $10,000 for each body, for each child he led the RCMP to. And then the next day we left at 9 o'clock when the money was delivered. Then we went

directly from there out looking for bodies. You get what I'm getting at? The kind of deal the Canadian police made with him, I don't think it had ever been done before or ever since. Some would say it was unconscionable. Others would say it was the only way to get him. would say it was the only way to get him. What it all meant was the extent of Olsen's crimes were never fully investigated. So we're going back to the Olsen tapes, opening boxes I sealed over 30 years ago. I reported on the story then, and I'll report on it now

and try as best I can to find the answers that so many are still seeking. About the RCMP, about Clifford Olson, and perhaps most importantly, about his victims. To do that, we need to talk to the family and friends whose lives were shattered all those years ago. This season on Calls from a Killer from CBC's Uncover. When we get down to the point where you got a missing nine-year-old kid who's six blocks from his home and disappears when he's at the corner store getting an ice cream or a candy bar. You got a big problem. I got another phone call. Mrs. Rosenfeld, I'm sorry, I guess that was your boy after all. That was the death notification. Our lives as we knew them died was Darren. This was a horrific, completely unbelievable revelation that a government had entered

into an agreement with a serial killer and paid him to return the bodies of his victims. You say you have nothing to lose so are you gonna kill again? I'm gonna spend the rest of my life in jail and I'm not prepared to do that. And one of these days, Arlene, I'm going to make a move and it's going to be a bloodbath. Calls from a Killer was written and produced by me, Nathaniel Frum, Arlene Bynan, and senior producers Ashley Mack and Andrew Friesen.

Additional writing by Alina Ghosh. Mixing and sound design by Evan Kelly. Emily Connell is our digital producer. Executive producers are Cecil Fernandes and Chris Oak. Tanya Springer is the senior manager and Arif Noorani is the director of CBC's Uncover. Or you can binge the whole series by subscribing to our True Crime Premium channel on Apple Podcasts. Just click on the link in the show description. That was the first episode of Calls from a Killer, a brand new season of CBC's Uncover.

The entire series is waiting for you right now. Just search for Uncover wherever you get your podcasts. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.