Someone Knows Something - S8 E4: Photograph

Episode Date: October 9, 2023

David and Laurie discover crucial new details about Angel’s last known whereabouts. A tipster emails David with information about a possible suspect, but are they willing to meet? Find the full-text transcript for this episode here: www.cbc.ca/1.6970507

Oh, hey there! I'm Andrew Fung and I want to tell you about my new series with ViaRail. Join me as I ride on from Toronto to Ottawa and London aboard ViaRail's new fleet of trains. My journey was a breeze. No traffic jams, just smooth sailing. The seats are super comfy and with complimentary Wi-Fi, I can work and play with ease. Plus, with meals and snacks on board, I arrived refreshed and ready to explore. From a boat cruise in Ottawa to the Grand Theatre in London, these cities are packed with amazing experiences. For your next trip, do yourself a favor. Skip traffic and take Via Rail.

Watch both episodes now on cbc.ca slash Via Rail. Paid content with Via Rail Canada. This is a CBC Podcast. of losing weight and losing my mind. Where do we go, this way? Yeah. Okay. Lori Strand and I heading to a riverside white horse park. The sun is out and keeps us going through another long summer's day. We're heading to a meeting with someone

who says they spent an evening with Angel around the time she disappeared. And Julie is? My cousin. She was good friends with Angel. And then she's like, I'm a little worried because it was so long ago, I don't remember anything. So it's the small things that I told her.

It is the small things. Also, I wonder if police actually talk to her. Police say Angel was last seen in downtown Whitehorse sometime on the evening of May 26th. But some versions of events I'm hearing about have Angel disappearing sometime before that, or perhaps after that, from a grad party. If there is a discrepancy, it needs to be cleared up. I have that feeling that we could solve this case together because everybody has a stake in it, everybody has something to say, and everybody wants to talk,

but you have to ask the right question. Yeah. I know some people are, they don't think they know anything, but you never know. I'm David Ridgen, and this is Someone Knows Something, Season 8,

The Angel Carlet Case, Episode 4, Photograph. Alright, so what do we got here? This is a photo Alex shared with me. So that's Angel, and then that's my cousin Julie, and that's my cousin Tamara. That's great. Let me get a picture of that. Sure. We've arrived at our interview location, and Lori is holding up her phone,

showing a photo we received from Alex. In it, Angel stands next to two other friends. One of them is Julie, or Jules, the person we are about to meet. It's the only photo I have seen of Angel from what appears to be around the time she disappeared, and it was taken at a graduation party. Angel appears relaxed in a navy blue sweat top, smiling wryly, holding a can of beer and giving the photographer the finger. And so Alex said this is the only picture that they got of the native grad. The night of native grad. Oh.

Yeah. So this is her last photo, basically. This is her last photo. Yeah. I wonder what time that photo was taken. Is the time on the picture somehow, or is it on part of the file? It's a photo of a photo, so if it's May, it's definitely around midnight, because the sun is setting.

You can see between 11 and 1, I'd put it in that aspect. Yeah, that's interesting. That's a good observation. Our conversation is cut short as Lori's cousin Jules arrives. Hey. Hi. This is David. This is my cousin Julie.

Nice to meet you. Tall and confident, with long, light brown hair, pull-on leather boots and jeans, we walk together through the grass, pull-on leather boots and jeans, we walked together through the grass to a spot beside the Yukon River. So, working on this podcast about Angel, and I saw a picture with you in it with Angel. I think it was taken around the time she disappeared. Alex shared the photo.

I hold the photo up on my phone. Its effect is immediate, as if Jules is pushed back gently by some invisible hand. Oh. You remember that? I'm trying to brighten it. A little bit. I think it was Chadburn.

Yeah. OK. I think it was Chadburn. Yeah. Okay. So that was the last place that many people remember seeing Angel, is that right? Yep. Chadburn Lake is a park about a 15-minute drive into the wilderness southeast of Whitehorse, still within city limits, and the annual site of many post-graduation parties. So what time would that have been taken, do you think, that day? Probably eight, nine, maybe ten. It was after the grad interviews.

What do you remember about Angel? She was outgoing, smart, funny. She was just a good person in general. Good friend. And how did that day unfold? Like you ended up at that after party. Did you go with Angel? Or did you just see her there? I think we all went together, like me, Angel, Tamara, and I think there was a couple other people, but it's hard to remember. Tamara Jim is the other person standing in the photo with Angel and Jules. I'll be trying to talk to her too. What do you remember about that night in terms of what the gathering was like? Out at Chadburn. Just a whole bunch of grads just finished graduating so having a couple drinks

having fun. Yeah. Enjoying life. And was Angel there? Can you remember sort of anybody else she was with in particular that night not really no just kind of hanging out with us and our little group and nobody that I knew of after the fact I guess yeah okay how did the evening come to an end then how when was the last time you remember seeing angel i think it was when the cops came or the fire department or something because then everybody kind of disperses right and then that was the last time that I've seen her because we all kind of just lost track of each other. It was dark by that point. So the police arrived, you say, or fire people arrived?

It's usually big bonfire sites. Oh, all right, okay. So at that point, the police or the breakup happened and then you didn't see her? Yeah, because that was the last time. There was no memory of sort of seeing her with somebody as you left or waving goodbye? No. Jules says she got home around 5 a.m., driven by her designated driver, Aunt Darlene.

She remembers police on the road checking cars, but she cannot recall if their vehicle was checked. Do you remember talking to anybody else who said that they saw Angel after the party? No. Would it be like Angel, in your estimation, to go with somebody she didn't know to get a ride home? No. We all kind of made sure we got home. And even if we were alone, we wouldn't just willingly go with anybody. But we're crazy, but not that crazy.

Jewel says this party at Chadburn Lake is the last place she and others she knows saw Angel. But it's unclear exactly what day this party took place. According to police, the last of several sightings of Angel on the evening of May 26th had her walking away from LePage Park in downtown Whitehorse around 9 p.m. with two whiter-looking men. Was the Chadburn party before those sightings, or could it have been after? I'll find out. In the meantime, I want to find Tamara, the other person in the photo with Angel and Jules. But she lives outside of town, some distance, and we'll have to go there to talk to her. On the way, we drop in for a quick look around at the Chadburn Lake site,

a single route in or out on a 10-kilometer gravel road. This is a long way out here. Yeah. But I mean, if it happened out here, then why not leave her here? Why pack her up and move her to almost an hour's drive from here? Like if we were to drive from Chadburn Lake all the way out to Pilot Mountain, it's about an hour's drive. That's a lot of time to risk being stopped.

I mean, us just driving out here, like, what, wave to four or five people. I can imagine this road being just packed with people on a night like that. The gravel road ends in a turnaround and a few rough parking spots. Down a short incline, a dock floats on a crystal of turquoise water overlooking yet another breathtaking vista. We turn toward a nearby large gazebo and what looks like a well-used campfire. Okay, so here we are at Shadburn. So the partying would be everywhere around here or just down here? People would party by their vehicles, you know,

and then down here is where the main party would be. Okay. There's a fire pit down here is where the main party would be. Okay. There's a fire pit down here. The fire pit, surrounded by a worn ring of packed and blackened soil, looks like it has been in operation for many years. The woods close in around it on three sides like a bowl, with the lake a short distance down that slope on the fourth side. It's been very useful

to see how far away this place is from downtown Whitehorse and the layout, but I don't know if there are any easy answers here. As we head back to the car, a pair of ravens flies by overhead. I had a case where I wish that the ravens could talk. Mm-hmm. These trees could talk. They'd tell you stories. I swear I'm getting eaten alive here, sorry. Me too.

Yeah. Stirred up all the bugs going up there. We get back in the car and drive to a community about half an hour from downtown Whitehorse. We're looking for Tamara, who Lori calls Mods, the other woman in the photo with Angel. I noticed their car is gone. And their other truck. Okay, so these guys aren't here. Yeah.

Come on Hot dogs. Nice, but not nice. I don't like dogs that I don't know. So far, all we have found is this barking dog. But eventually, Lori flags down someone else she knows, and they lead us right to Tamara's doorstep. Everyone knows everyone everywhere, it seems, in the Yukon. We are here. Hey!

Hello. Hi, Mott. I'm so very sorry. No worries. Tamara grabs a coffee and joins us on the porch in her sock feet, wearing a black hoodie and white sweats. Lori shows her the photograph and, like Jules, Tamara takes some time as it hits her, leaning on her doorframe and gazing out onto the landscape. Tamara also remembers this photo being taken at the Chadburn Lake party.

What time did you guys leave Chadburn? Like 10 midnight? It wasn't very late at all. At the Chadburn party, did you notice anybody that was there that shouldn't have been there? That was, you know, like, different? No, we left relatively early. Because Auntie Darlene, somebody had, like, thrown their alcohol. And it, like, hit her truck. So Auntie Darlene was like, hey, that's it.

Get in. We're leaving. And then the party continued on at her house. Oh, okay. Yeah. So did Angel continued on at her house. Oh, okay. Yeah. So did Angel go to that? Yeah. Oh, okay.

You saw her there? Yeah, at the house. Yeah. Because someone else I talked to said nobody saw Angel after the Chadburn thing. Oh, no. Said that everybody was worried the next day. No. Or within two days, for sure, people were wondering where she was.

No, it was after the Chadburn thing. I remember that. Party was the Friday, and then there was a barbecue or something, like a fire in a relative's backyard. There was, like, not really any drinks going around. Angel wanted to go downtown to look for more drinks and wanted me to go with her, but I didn't want to. I just ended up staying in the village.

So another party right after Chadburn, and then sometime after that, during the day, a barbecue. According to Tamara, Angel had been at both. And you're sure the barbecue came after that, after Chadburn? Yeah, it was after Chadburn. Yeah, because Native grad is typically on a Friday, so the party would have been on the Friday, and then the 26th could have been the barbecue.

The last sighting was the barbecue, that barbecue. That changes things. It does. Yeah, because then it puts her into downtown, which is why the police are talking about that. Jules clearly said that she last saw her at the lake. Was Julie at the barbecue? I don't think so.

So that makes sense. That makes sense, yeah. Okay, so now we're tracking her through to the Saturday, which could be the day of the barbecue. We'll figure that out. Yeah. A complicating factor is that a flyer we have advertises a native grad in May 2007

and says that a party at Chadburn is to be held on May 19th, the week before the 25th and 26th. There were several parties and perhaps more than one at Chadburn Lake, so my operating theory will have to be here that the party at Chadburn, the one where that last photo of Angel was taken alongside her two friends with her hair done for graduation happened on Friday, May 25th, and the barbecue Tamara is referring to happened probably on Saturday the 26th. I remember that police confirmed that Angel was working at Blue Feather up to at least May 25th, leaving work that day at 8pm. So according to this theory and Tamara and police information,

Angel did not disappear from Chadburn Lake. Now we just have to worry about all of Whitehorse. We thought that it was easier with Chadburn because it's just a bottleneck and there's only certain numbers of people in and out. Did you talk to Angel at the barbecue? Yeah. Do you remember anything she talked about? Well, I don't know.

Like we were talking mostly just like kind of joking around, lots of stuff, like lots of joking things, I think. And then really the last thing I remember was her wanting to go downtown to look for more drinking, like some more drinks. Did anybody go with her? She was asking me to go with her, but I didn't want to go downtown. And nobody else went? We didn't have any her, but I didn't want to go downtown. And nobody else went? We didn't have any money.

She didn't have any money either. So basically, it was going to be just finding who was partying. How did she get downtown, do you think? She had a bike. Okay. Do you remember what color her bike was? No, but I do remember her having a BMX bike. Like a smaller, kind of a silver BMX bike. Do you remember anything about the bike being found later? I remember her having a BMX bike, like a smaller kind of a maybe silver BMX bike.

Do you remember anything about the bike being found later? No. Okay. Do you remember anything about Angel? I'm just gonna sound like a grilling, I apologize. That's okay. Do you remember anybody different being there? Anybody different you hadn't seen before or knew? No, just the ordinary.

You think she'd get in a car with someone she didn't know? Possibly. I think that, like, there was a lot of times I had to, like, lecture her about just not, like, making unsafe choices, especially when it came to, like, wanting to keep drinking and stuff like that. Okay.

Not an easy one to answer, but Tamara is less sure than Jules on the question of who Angel might trust. And how did she respond to those lectures, what you call lectures? She'd be like, I know, Mats, I know, and stuff like that. So you're certain that she didn't leave with somebody? No. Okay. And going forward, after Angel disappeared, did you hear anything from anybody about what might have happened

or that you felt was credible? Not really. Say she found a drink or whatever, where would she go? Literally, she would go with whoever's drinking, whoever has it. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. drinking like whoever has it and then yeah yeah in your mind you may have constructed kind of a narrative of what might have happened did you ever think what's the scenario that would have involved ending up with angel being found up in

that pilot mountain i don't know I am like somewhere over the years I find that I kind of heard that there was like fighting with some girls I don't know what they did after like where they took her I have no idea does it seem likely that she would be fighting with girls I mean the fighting part but then the going

up to the pilot mountain part like I don't think that would be did anybody that you knew ever go to Pilot Mountain to party? No. Did you ever even know that there was something up there to party at? No. So that, I mean, I think that the circle around Pilot Mountain is of interest. Yeah.

Did you know anyone from there? Did Angel know anyone from there? From, like, the area up there? Yeah, from up there. I don't think so. In particular? No. Have you ever been out to that spot? Like, have you gone out to look at the site? Yeah, from up there. I don't think so. In particular. Have you ever been out to that spot?

Like, have you gone out to look at the site? It's okay. I'm sharing too much with you. No, it's okay. I'm okay, yeah. Tamara feels like one of the last friendly links with Angel, but maybe I'm pushing for info too hard. We all pause for a moment here on the porch before Tamara continues.

Honestly, I always just loosely look back and wish that I didn't let her go alone. Yeah. That I should have gone with her. It was like my first big loss as a kid. I didn't really know how to navigate through that. My parents were really kind of going through like unlearning their own trauma so they didn't know how to really be there for mine. So it went pretty dark for a little while. A lot of the same people that she hung out with are probably feeling really lost.

Thanks very much. Yeah, no problem. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much. I leave Lori with her friend to say goodbye and wander out by the car. Oh, hey there! I'm Andrew Fung, and I want to tell you about my new series with Via Rail.

Join me as I ride on from Toronto to Ottawa and London aboard Via Rail's new fleet of trains. My journey was a breeze. No traffic jams, just smooth sailing. The seats are super comfy, and with complimentary Wi-Fi, I can work and play with ease. Plus, with meals and snacks on board, I arrived refreshed and ready to explore. From a boat cruise in Ottawa to the Grand Theatre in London, these cities are packed with amazing experiences. For your next trip, do yourself a favor, skip traffic and take Via Rail. Watch both episodes now on cbc.ca slash Via Rail. Paid content with Via Rail Canada. At Desjardins, we speak business.

We speak equipment modernization. We're fluent in data digitization and expansion into foreign markets. And we can talk all day about streamlining manufacturing processes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do, business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us and contact Desjardins today. We'd love to talk business. There's Andy right there. Oh, is that me?

Yeah, that's who we were meeting. Darlene Jim acted as designated driver on the night of the Chadburn Lake party. I want to know how she remembers everything. We've met in the Staples parking lot with the mural of Angel and Wendy as our backdrop. Hi. Hello. Hi, Auntie. Thank you for joining us.

Appreciate it. This is David. Nice to meet you. Hi, nice to meet you. Thank you for joining us. Appreciate it. This is David. Nice to meet you. Hi, nice to meet you. Thank you for coming. Darlene in glasses and a raincoat with short brown hair carries an air of calm authority that's hard to miss. She's been on the move traveling,

but made time for us to talk about Angel's case. I was interested in talking to you, Darlene, about driving the day of the party at Chadburn. Yeah, and Angel stayed with me. This is the day after Chadburn. This is the day after. She stayed at my place. I had her and my niece Tamara stay,

and then some other children that stayed as well. Do you know who the other children were? Geez, I can't even remember who it was now. But I know for sure Tamara and my boys were there. So we got her out of Chadburn. Yes. We got her at your place. So that accounts for the Friday night, Saturday morning.

So the Saturday the 26th, right? Saturday the 26th. About 11-ish, yeah, she left my place in the morning. Did she eat breakfast at your house? Geez, I can't even remember. I'm pretty sure she did. I'm pretty sure she had some breakfast. But she was kind of feeling hungover from the night before.

And why did she leave? She needed to go downtown to change clothes or something, and she was going to come back up for supper. Well, she left at 11 in the morning, but somebody said they'd seen her at 3. And then we've been calling I'm pretty sure it's after 3 or so going on for we started calling her and no answer no answer no answer no answer did she have a phone yeah she had a phone she did

have a phone we were calling yeah she did have a phone because she was calling us. That's interesting. Police say that they are unaware of Angel potentially having a cell phone, but they do say that Angel used programs like Bebo, an early social media app that featured messaging, and Hotmail, and that police went through all of that correspondence but found nothing they thought was important. Yeah, because it's not normal for her not to, like, she knows my number. I had a landline.

Then she could have called and said, you know, I need a pickup, I need a ride or something. She didn't call. Yeah, and she knew. At the time, she was parting laws, so I took my apartment keys away from her because I was going to be out of town that weekend. I didn't want her to get us kicked out. So I'm wondering where she had a bag, like if she was staying with someone else that I'm not aware of. In Tamara's memory, Angel said she wanted to look for a drink.

In Darlene's, Angel was looking for a change of clothes. In both, Angel left before the barbecue really got started. Was there any distress, signs of distress in her, or was there anyone else that left with her? No, no. Did you have the barbecue? I had the barbecue, and we were waiting for her, and we were asking people where she was, and nobody seen her.

She never showed up. She never came. How long was it after that that you started to really worry or wonder where Angel was? About like... That day? Yeah. That day? Yeah. When Angel left your place, this is the photo from grad night, supposedly.

Sorry, it's kind of dark. So that's what she had on at Chadburn. Is that what she had on when she left you? Yeah. Yeah, she had the same clothes because she didn't have clothes to change into. She stayed in the same clothes. Okay. Yeah.

Did you ever hear of any kids or anybody partying out at the Pilot Mountain area? No. No. Would any of your kids ever drive allying out at the Pilot Mountain area? No. Would any of your kids ever drive all the way out there to party? Hell no. They'll go to Chadburn or they'll go to a lake around here, but they won't go way the heck out there. Did you see her drive away on a bike that day? No. Because Tamara thinks she did.

Oh, she walked. She walked. She didn't have her bike. I was chauffeuring them. Okay. Yeah, so she didn't have her bike. I was chauffeuring them. Yeah, so she didn't have her bike with me. She probably got a lift. She probably just walked. And apparently she ended up downtown. If Angel was looking for a drink

that aligns with Alex's sighting of her later near the 420 park, she told him the same. At that time, she did apparently have her bike. If she was looking for clothing, where would she have gone, and would that be the same place she got her bike from? Was she staying at a different location than Laurie's? Now that we have a better idea of Angel's timeline, it's time to spread the scope of the investigation toward tips and toward Pilot Mountain. One tip that came in after I put a call out for information on Angel's case offered a bit of both, but there was just one problem.

She gave me a tip, but she won't come back to me. Her email starts with the name, and then I think that's it. That's all I have. Oh, I know her. You do? And I have her phone number, too. You're kidding. Nope.

Lori calls the woman and sets up the meeting. Like I said, everyone knows everyone in the Yukon. Was that her there? Yeah, there we go. Nice. That was a loud whistle. Sorry, I should have warned you. The woman who emailed me approaches Lori and I as we stand waiting for her on a trail. How are you?

Hi, how are you? Hi. The bugs are a little bad by the 12 o'clock. Yeah, maybe we should just keep sort of walking slowly just to kind of keep the bugs off along here if that's okay with you. Okay, yeah, sure. So we can just start now. So you contacted me, and why did you contact me?

I live in Whitehorse, and I was aware of Angel's murder because in a small town, you know, you're aware of missing people and everyone's connected. And I had an experience during the time Angel was missing, and it always sort of haunted me. And I dealt with it and sort of stuffed it. And then when I saw you reaching out looking for information, I felt compelled to email you and yeah okay so this is the period between May 2007 and November when she was found you had this experience okay it would have been really close after her disappearance So it was within that period. Okay. So tell me about what you experienced.

I used to live out on the Mayo Road. And one morning I was commuting to town fairly quickly. And we were having breakfast. And I think it was a late brunch. It was a Sunday. I think it was a Sunday. And there's a straight stretch out there. and I was coming to a road which is now called Boreal Road and at the time it was just being put in. That connects the Pilot Mountain subdivision. And there was a red truck at the corner at the stop sign and I recognized the man driving from, again, small town. I had called him in previously as a suspicious person for following young teenage girls downtown, looking out his window, catcalling them. He was, like, rubbernecking, like, very young girls walking,

like, 11 to 13, Indigenous girls at the time. And frequently I would see him like downtown and again, just staring. And I always had this innate ability to know, making models of vehicles. So it was like early nineties, F one 50 red in color. It was red.

Um, box and cap. Pardon me? Box and cab were red. Yes. And it did have a cap. No. Okay. Yeah. And it didn't have a cap? No.

Okay. Yeah, and so at that time, I just, him and I locked eyes, and it was just one of those eerie, like, people who don't give you a good feeling. And I just kept driving, and that was my experience. But after that, when I would see him in town and downtown, I started having flashes of angel's face and my body would go ice cold. It was like there was ice in my veins. And then this went on for a while and he was always someone I just kept an eye on, like, because of that experience.

You're kind of tracking him a bit. Yeah. And since that's happened, somebody spray-painted the word diddler on his van. Oh. You know it was his van? His van, yeah. Did he live out there at the time?

I don't believe so. Okay. That's why I thought it was weird, because he lived in Riverdale. She gives me the man's name and describes him. Did you ever talk to police about him? No. No. Nice morning here.

It's about, let's see, 11 degrees Celsius. 9 a.m. Saturday morning. Whitehorse. Brisk, as they say. No better time than the right now to act on a tip. I'm on my way to the house where the man allegedly seen on Pilot Mountain by the tipster apparently lives. I want to see if he knew Angel, if he remembers the case, if he has any knowledge or information

that might help, and see where it goes from there. I've gone by his house a couple of times, and it seems pretty quiet. It's like a fine little house. Nestled amidst other houses that are older and more decrepit. This house seems nicely cared for. Fence around it. Manicured lawn. Well-kept truck in the driveway.

This man may own the house. May rent from the owners. I think I'm going to park a little bit away from the place. Walk up so he doesn't know what vehicle I came in. It's the usual practice. Let's see what happens here. Okay, looks like the truck is there. I'll go to the front door. Honey-colored house. Good morning. Hi.

Hi. Someone Knows Something is hosted, written, and produced by me, David Ridgen. The series is also produced by Hadil Abdel-Nabi and Zaina Salem. Sound design by Evan Kelly. Natalia Ferguson is our transcriber. Emily Connell is our digital producer. Chris Oak is our story editor. Our executive producer is Cecil Fernandez. And the director of CBC Podcasts is Arif Noorani. You can hear next week's episode now by searching for the CBC Podcasts

channel on YouTube, or you can hear all seven episodes today by subscribing to the CBC True Crime Premium channel on Apple Podcasts, where you can binge the full season ad-free. Just click on the link in the show description.

If you want more from CBC Podcasts, consider listening to Cooper Island, an investigation into one of Canada's most horrific residential schools. Find it on all podcast apps. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.