Someone Knows Something - S1 & S2 Update and what's next

Episode Date: September 18, 2017

In a live Q&A from CBC Hamilton, David provides updates on the Adrien McNaughton and Sheryl Sheppard cases, as well as a sneak peek at what’s to come.

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Just walking up to CBC Hamilton. Going to do a Q&A session here for all the SKS listeners around the world. Answer questions that are submitted by the audience and talk about the results of the forensic analysis of the items we found during the third dive for Adrian McNaughton up at Holmes Lake. We found something that looked like a tooth to us and some other items and the OPP came back and said the tooth was not human. But I'm hoping to also update people on three new seasons we have coming out of SKS. Season three will be going back to Mississippi. Season four, looking at the case of Wayne Gervais. And season five, well, Knows Something from CBC Original Podcasts. Last spring, SKS host David Ridgen participated in a live Q&A from the offices of CBC Hamilton.

Since then, the team has been working on cases both old and new. This is an update on seasons one and two, as well as a sneak peek of what's to come. Here's David in conversation with the host of CBC's podcast playlist, Lindsay Michael. So today with me is producer, writer, and host of Someone Knows Something, David Ridgen. Hi, David. Hello. We have some guests here today that you wanted to mention.

Yeah, we have some guests from season two. We have Odette Fisher is here, Cheryl's mother, Cheryl Shepard's mother. And we'll be talking to Odette a little later. And there's other people here that have participated in the podcast with us. So for those of you who might not know Someone Knows Something, I'll just give you a quick rundown. So it's a true crime podcast from CBC Radio and each season,

David investigates a different case with an eye to reopening them. So he will follow leads with victims' family members. He will search for answers with friends and he will also talk to people who haven't revealed information before. Season one was about the disappearance of five-year-old Adrian McNaughton, who went missing on a family fishing trip in 1972.

Season two took place right here in Hamilton, Ontario, and it investigates the case of Cheryl Shepard. On December 31st, 1997, at a New Year's Eve party, Cheryl Shepard was proposed to live on television, and just two days later, she disappeared, and she hasn't been seen since. So both of these cases are ongoing, and one of the most exciting aspects of the show is that there are updates that come long after the season has ended, and I think we might hear some updates this afternoon.

So I think our first question comes from Bella, and Bella says, since the items pulled from the small lake were shown not to be human remains. That looks like a tooth. It does. That looks like a tooth. It looks like a tooth, but who knows? Jeez. Will you be doing any more dives?

Will we be doing any more dives? That's an interesting question because we're in the process right now of talking about that with the divers. The McNaughton family has given the go-ahead. I've talked to them. Do we do another dive? This would be the fourth dive. And we're going to look at it from a very practical, we've got to really dig deep in that lake kind of way. So it means we have to bring more equipment, heavier equipment.

We have to have more volunteers. And we'll probably have to do it with government assistance because we're going to have to dig at the bottom of the lake. And we need permits from natural resources, et cetera. And we don't want to do it in a way that's always going to disrupt the ecosystem in the lake or permanently damage anything in the lake in the search for Adrian. But the divers and the family and myself and SKS, we're committed to continuing that search. Someone had asked about the rubber from the shoe that we found in the second dive. What's this? We found some rubber amid the sludge.

I had the email from the police here, and this is from Rob Hagerman, the OPP officer who is working on the McNaughton case right now. And he says, we spoke to CFS about the rubber, and there were no tests or examinations they could do that would provide any useful information. Thanks, says Rob. So that was interesting about the rubber.

It's, I guess, impossible to tell. CFS is one of the preeminent labs in the country, if not North America. So if they can't figure out a way, then it's probably pretty difficult, short of finding shoes from that era and trying to figure out what size it would have been and things like that. So that's the answer about the rubber. Okay. Where do the McNaughtons stand with regards to continuing? Has it helped them so far?

I believe it's been helpful, the process. I mean, obviously it's a huge amount of attention on a family that's a very private family, but I think in the end they've decided as a whole that it was a positive experience. They're interested in going forward on this next dive if it happens and we're not going to give up on it. Okay. So we have some questions from season two. Jamie emailed to ask, I keep coming back to the recording she gave a friend in case she, Cheryl, disappeared or something happened to her. Where is it and have you heard it? I have not heard the recording despite repeat requests to police here. They say that they have it in the evidence boxes that they have. They have several evidence boxes and it's on a micro tape, micro recording tape and it's a conversation allegedly between Cheryl

and Michael Lavoie about a court case that involves them. It's a taped conversation in a way that is obvious that Michael does not know it's being taped, the person who's been identified as Michael. So that's all I know. This is a question from Catherine. You always describe the pets of everyone you interview. I've noticed lots of dogs mentioned in the podcast. Everybody has a dog.

Hello. What's your name? Hello, Muffy. One of the chihuahuas, whose name is Chester, seems agitated, so I take him onto my lap What's your name? Muffy. Hello, Muffy. One of the chihuahuas, whose name is Chester, seems agitated, so I take him onto my lap, and he remains there for the duration of our interview. That's a big dog. What is it about them that you find so interesting, and do you have any pets?

I do have pets. In fact, I don't really call them pets. I call them friends. So I have two friends that live at home with me. Yeah. Twig and Spock. Two Siamese pets. One is cross-eyed and the other isn't. So it's awesome. I like the imperfection of it all.

And they're just great guys. So yeah, why do I describe the pets? It's part of the scene, part of the atmosphere. Pets are very close to the people who have them. It's a great way to get to know people through their pets. And I love the fact that they're there because they calm me down. Cool. Okay, so this is another question.

Jennifer asks, David, could you comment on what you think is the best way to solve this case? This is season two. If it is by increasing the reward, do you think it could be seen as a possible mechanism for raising the value of the reward? Do you think that would help with the case? I think raising the reward is a positive step in the right direction. It's currently at $50,000. There's a petition that's out now, actually. Noah Kersner and Sarah Farrer and the audience, and they both worked on the petition to seek out a higher reward fund and

I can get Noah to come and talk to us about that this is all audience participation from SKS outside of CBC or anything so someone else on Facebook asked police could audience put money into a new reward fund and the answer was for now no which I don't think is a hard no but it's no for now and then the question becomes how do you raise money and everybody sort of be trusting that the person raising the money is not taking the money? So we have to be careful about that. The petition is different in that it rallies the sort of support around police trying to get them to actually raise their own reward fund, which is how it happens. The police service board approves a reward fund and if the city or the people of Hamilton sign this petition, the hope is that they'll raise it. And that's an official? That would be

an official internal kind of operation bonded so no one's stealing the money. But Noah's been great. He contacted me and said, what can I do to help in the Cheryl Shepard case? Sarah's been diligently following along. They're both very active on the case and on trying to find solutions. So I'll just take it away. So basically, we have this petition, and we're basically talking to two Hamilton councillors. That's Terry Whitehead and Lloyd Ferguson, and also Fred Eisenberger of the mayor of Hamilton. And we're basically just trying to collect as many signatures as possible to bring to them. We're trying to get the reward fund raised, obviously,

and we're also trying to get police investigators back involved, as you said they already are, which is great. So we want them to do some more work, and we also want... Lots of signatures. Lots of signatures, obviously. So if you just go on Google and search Help Find Cheryl Shepard, it'll be the first thing that pops up. And we have about 800 signatures online, and then I think we have at least a thousand manually by now so things are looking pretty good. So almost 2,000

signatures that's good and you've just started I went out with these guys with Odette. Excuse me sir do you have a minute to sign a petition for us? Sure. We're trying to gather signatures to bring awareness to a case a local case in Hamilton about a missing person named Cheryl Shepard about 19 years ago. So we are trying to just gather signatures together. We are trying to increase the reward because we think that may help. And also just to ask police to re-look at the case with the information that's come forward as a result of the podcast. So would you mind signing these?

Would you mind? That would be so very much appreciated. Thank you so much for helping out. Really appreciate it. That's been going on for so long. I'm not giving up. Good for you. It's a nightmare.

I feel for you. I really do. I hope at some point you find yourself. I hope so. You get closure. I hope so. And everybody was signing, and I think what they're doing is starting to leave them in stores and people in Hamilton are signing.

The position, I think it's change.org, is that the site? It's change.org. Where the actual digital one is. So people basically just have to go, I think they put their email address in and then they say, yes, I sign. Yeah, I'd appreciate it if anybody could go online and sign it.

It's really helpful and every signature definitely counts. Yep, thanks. So that again will be helping to raise reward fund. And I think that a raised reward fund in this particular case could definitely help. There's definitely people who know something that I think might be encouraged by more than $50,000. Really interesting. Yep. Okay. This is a question from Janelle from Facebook. Do you approach the families of the missing people first before you decide to devote a whole season to that person?

Or do you decide the case first and then approach the families? I do both. I decide the case, I go to the family, and if I can't get a family member to work with me, I can't work on the case. Right. I have to know one before I go to the other, but then if I can't get the other, then I won't do it.

I have to have family approval and family participation. And is that an easy thing to achieve? is that no it's the hardest thing actually Yeah, it's the hardest thing and it's the thing you have that requires a lot more patience and I'm a patient person But sometimes it can take years to get access to a family like I've got cases I'm still working on trying to get family access and other cases sometimes it's just I don't want to talk to you and then it's Another person talks them and maybe they'll want to talk to you. And then it's another person talks to them and maybe they'll want to talk to me a little more. And it takes

a lot of time. I think Odette, when I contacted you, it was through Peter Tom, right? That's right. Yeah. Yeah, he told me quite a bit about you. And I was quite pleased, you know, because I do want to find her. Yeah. Her being, you know. I know she's gone. But I just

want to put her at rest. It's been a long time, you know, and every day, you know, I think of her. And I pray, you know, that one day we're going to get an answer. She didn't deserve this. I miss her. I looked at her picture and I thought, why, why her, you know? Thanks, Odette. Thank you.

It must be very painful to kind of dig into these cases that have been there for a long time. How do you manage to keep doing that and to keep kind of the investigation comfortable for family members? I think I block it out, actually. Yeah? Yeah, I think think I block it out, actually. Yeah? Yeah, I think I probably block it out. I suffered a lot of anxiety and panic attacks when I was younger,

and I learned how to kind of calm myself down, and I do that all the time. And I think it kind of helps me to stay serene in the face of, like, terror. Right. So I think that that actually has helped me. CJ from Facebook is wondering about season three and wondering if there's anything at all you're working on right now that you can tell us about, about any of the seasons.

Yes. Season three, coming November 2017. It was the wrong body. The finding of a Negro male was noted and forgotten. The search was not wrong body. The finding of a Negro male was noted and forgotten. The search was not for him. If I used to ride the road in Mississippi, I kept my revolver right on the seat. Thirty-two. I just hope I see five or six of them in the road trying to block me.

I'm going to take three of them out with me. You can get to the road. Go get back in the car now. He just wants to talk. Get off of my place. Go on. I'm sorry, sir. He just wants to talk. Get off of my place. Go on. I'm sorry, sir. He just wants to talk. Get in your car and get away from me.

Season 4, coming this winter. For any high explosive, you need a lesser explosive to set it off. It's like a chain reaction. It happens like that. It looked like there was a snow angel on the wall, but it was sprayed with blood around the outside. There's somebody out there, I think, that knows something. And Someone Knows Something, Season 5, coming spring 2018.

A lot of work has been put into this investigation through the years. People that have worked on it were very passionate about this investigation, given the circumstances behind what happened. I think it hits a home with a lot of people, and that's why a lot of people put so much effort, and it shocked the community when it happened. Really, it's just a sad set of circumstances. If you'd like to watch the extended video of the live Q&A, visit us on Facebook or at cbc.ca slash sks.

Someone Knows Something is hosted, written, and produced by David Ridgen. The series is also produced by Chris Oak, Steph Kampf, Amal Delich, Eunice Kim, and executive producer Arif Noorani, and mixed by Cecil Fernandez. Our theme music is by Bob Wiseman, with vocals by Mary Margaret O'Hara and Jess Reimer. Rhymer. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.