Someone Knows Something - S9 E5: A Bear In The Woods

Episode Date: December 4, 2024

The finale. The aftermath of Ringel's trial, what happened, and what was learned. David and Mary Ann embark on a search for Chrissy’s body.Watch David Ridgen's original television documentary from 2012, 'Confession to Murder Part I' and 'Confession to Murder Part II'.

Hey there, I'm Kathleen Goltar and I have a confession to make. I am a true crime fanatic. I devour books and films and, most of all, true crime podcasts. But sometimes, I just want to know more. I want to go deeper. And that's where my podcast, Crime Story, comes in. Every week, I go behind the scenes with the creators of the best in true crime. I chat with the host of Scamanda, Teacher's Pet, Bone Valley, the list goes on. For the insider scoop, find Crime Story in your podcast app. This is a CBC Podcast. The following episode contains difficult subject matter, including references to sexual assault.

Please take care. Hello? Hey Marianne, it's Dave Ridgen here. I'm just outside. Okay, I'll be right down. Okay. Hi. There she is. How are you? I was trying to think of the last time I saw you, it would have been...

Long time ago. Long time ago. Yeah. Nice to see you. Good seeing you here. I'm a little slow going upstairs these days. That's okay. It's been over 15 years since I first began working on Chrissy's case, and I'm here to

see Mary Ann now because there's still more to do. Oh man, excuse the mess. Oh, no problem. Hi kitty cat. Oh, there's Christine right there. The same Chrissy in Glasses photo in the same frame that I first saw her in at the Hanover church so long ago.

I pick it up and it's heavy. Chrissy is staring back at me. A face I have come to know so well after all these years. Mary Ann looks older, maybe paler, more fragile. Sean Russworm, Mary Ann's former husband, is noticeably absent from the scene. Mary Ann says that they ended their many years together in estrangement. What's the kitty cat's name here? Char. He's a pain in the ass. You used to have chihuahuas, didn't you? They're in the bedroom or they won't stop barking. Yeah.

They're 13 and 12. Can I see the dogs? I'll bring them out. The nature of the work that needs to be done changes as cases progress. Can I see the dogs? The nature of the work that needs to be done changes as cases progress, even when justice comes. I know the day of the court, the police took me aside and they told me how they got him like, undercover, and that he did kill her and, you know, he raped her and pushed her head down into a puddle or something, they said. But they wouldn't give me any answers

to any of my questions. They said, that's all we can tell you. After his re-arrest following the undercover operation, Anthony Ringo is jailed to await proceedings. When court begins in November of 2014, Mary Ann says she is told by police not to attend in case she has to testify. I know all the different emotions you go through and you know how you got to handle it and everybody kept telling me why aren't you crying? I said, that's not going to get nothing done. I said, you got to be strong to try and get somewhere.

I said, crying is when you're in your bedroom at night. At pretrial, the defense and prosecution make their arguments before a judge for what evidence should be included at trial. Ringles lawyer Stephen Gale mounts his most strident argument on what he says is a tainting of Ringles' newest confession by my CBC film. Basically, because some of Ringles' admissions to killing Christine were deemed inadmissible in Ringles' 2006 pretrial, any of those excluded

admissions Ringles saw in the film tainted his new confession to the UCs. But the prosecution successfully argues against that. Judge C.J. Conlon agrees, stating, I conclude that the February 2013 admissions were not obtained in a manner that infringed or denied Mr. Ringle's charter rights and the defense tainting application is therefore dismissed. In his ruling, Conlon writes, there is no question that the CBC film was deliberately used by the police as a ploy, a lure to produce a confession to murder, and it worked.

The confessions based on Ringle's viewing of my doc are allowed into evidence and Ringle's trial is set for June 2016. Marianne attends but the details of what happened are obscured in a sea of legalese, and Ringle never takes the stand. Ringo pleads guilty to second-degree murder, avoiding a full trial, and is sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 12 years.

So where does this all leave Mary Ann, and where can she go from here? I haven't moved on. I went down a few times and just put flowers in the river. We made her a really nice cross and we put it back in the site. They say I have post-traumatic stress disorder from it, but there's nothing they can do to help me, so I'm stuck. Where's my answers?

I'm David Rigeon, and this is Someone Knows Something, Season 9, The Christine Heron Case, Episode 5, A Bear in the Woods. Mary Ann Russworm, it took more than two decades, but there is now someone in jail for your daughter Christine's murder. How much has that changed things for you? It's changed a little bit because there's a little bit of justice there. Mary Ann speaking in the weeks after Ringle's conviction with CBC radio host Anna Maria Tormonti. Yeah, this is never going to go away. For me, it's a daily challenge,

just trying to live my life. And ever since she went missing, I don't celebrate holidays or anything because it doesn't feel right without her there. Like with my case, I don't have a body, so that is very difficult. I can't bury her, give her a proper burial. She was just like she was thrown away in garbage, you know?

But you know, keep trying and try to get your answers however you can. Don't always rely on the police. You've got to do it yourself. You've got to push them every day. I don't like the way the police handled the case at all. They made so many errors, and it was David Rigeon that brought all the errors to light for me. He started showing me paperwork with all the mistakes that they had made, and I was very

angry. I believe that this case has come down for a guilty plea because of David Rigeant, of what he's done. The late musician Daniel Johnson once sang some lyrics that I found instructive. Do yourself a favor, become your own savior. We don't need an outside force to make the change that is needed and and Marianne exemplifies this by never giving up on justice for Chrissy and being the reason any documentary could be made in the first place. Did you ever get the chance to talk to Anthony Ringle person to person, like face to face?

No, because every time I went to try and find him somewhere, he'd see me and he'd run. It should have been the other way around. Should have been me hiding from him, but no, it was the other way around. I still want to hear what he has to say and what happened. Because yeah, I'd read a long impact statement and it didn't seem to make a difference to him. Did the police tell you specifics of how they got him to say anything, or did they tell you any other detail about... They wouldn't.

So, just in terms of going forward, if I go and try to find how to get in touch with Ringle, I find out where he is, do I include you on the letter and say, we want to talk to you, or do and say, we want to talk to you? Or do I say, I want to, and then you just come? I'll go with you. Yeah. Yeah. I want to be there.

You should be there with me. Yeah. I definitely want to be there. I want to hear what he has to say, but it's his version. He's still never really know. I'm strong though. I know that. Strong person. I know that.

Yeah. Yeah. I've had to be all these years. Let's find out how to work that then. (*phone ringing*) Carchile Service Canada, Bonjour. Hi there, I'm trying to determine- I'll give you access to information, general inquiries. Okay. 1844. 1844.

Thank you for calling Correctional Service Canada, access to information and privacy division. Hi there, I'm trying to confirm if someone is in federal custody here. Yes, I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. I'm in federal custody. Thank you for calling Correctional Service Canada, Access to Information and Privacy Division.

Hi there, I'm trying to confirm if someone is in federal custody here in Ontario or elsewhere in Canada. Anthony Edward Ringel. But no callbacks from Corrections Canada. So I craft a letter with Mary Ann. Without knowing exactly where Ringel is in custody, I send several of them to some of the likely prisons where he might be. It's a little bit noisy back here, but it's okay.

So I can put the computer right here. I brought some clips from the undercover operation to show you. We wait for several months. Ringel doesn't respond to the letters, so I reconvene with Mary-Anne. Have you seen any of this before? No, I wasn't allowed to. I've set up the computer with the UC videos on it on a little plastic table in a secluded area

outside of Mary-Anne's apartment. It's a place that feels safe for her to watch. My belief, shared by Mary-Anne, is that by confronting this footage for the first time outside of Mary Ann's apartment. It's a place that feels safe for her to watch. My belief, shared by Mary Ann, is that by confronting this footage for the first time, she can help herself to dispel some of her lingering demons. Courtroom justice is one thing, being a survivor is another. So, some of it's pretty difficult listening and in fact, I haven't, in the podcast, I haven't put a lot of that in.

But I think it's important that you have the option of learning what he said. Yes. And I know, Marianne, that you say you're strong and I know everybody thinks they're strong, but you can't kind of unhear this stuff, right? And you'll see him saying it too. So, but with that in mind, I can show you and we can, are you okay? We'll keep going. Are you okay? We'll keep going. But only if you want to look at it because you had said that you want to know the truth.

I want to know. And Anthony has not responded yet to anything I've sent to him. So in terms of us going to talk to him, I'm not sure when that might happen. Can you see that? Yes. I play the first clip of Undercover Police video that shows the general setup of the apartment, the UC and Ringle, watching my documentary around the laptop computer. I want Marianne to see how Ringle starts reacting to the documentary as he watches. Let's play this here.

You gotta keep on watching this because it tells everything like... They screwed up. I've got more anger towards the OPP and the town cops than I do rank them. Well why don't you come and visit our fucking house and... ...do this shit. Either the OPP or Hanover Police Departments have agreed to speak on the record about this case. So that's kind of introduction to what the scene is like. So you see Anthony starting to talk about the case here. Anything strike you? Did you imagine it being like

this or? I didn't think he'd be that casual about it. Apparently in or close to a marshy lagoon, Brangle reportedly raped Christine and drowned her. He allegedly returned to the area a following day to bury her face down and naked in a makeshift grave. Not only does the OPP bring Rangel to these locations... I don't understand why they can't find him. Hello, woman's buried. I'm fucking shitting. Did you catch what he said? Yeah.

This is the transcript. Anthony, I don't understand why they couldn't find it. You see, mm-hmm, Anthony, she wasn't really buried. And that's the beginning. So that's the beginning of his confession, basically. And it goes on and on and on and on for hours. Wow. Yeah. See, that quarter was our favorite place. All available documents, including interviews...

So he says, I didn't know it was their favorite place. ...and other courtroom statements. This is one of the best... And so on. I play clip after clip for Mary Ann, with Ringle becoming increasingly open about what he did that day. Mary Ann watches all of it intently, showing little emotion. I do not play the most graphic clips.

I will leave her to watch those on her own whenever she might be ready. It makes me angry to see him act that way on camera, you know, be so callous about it, that he does seem to care what he did. It upsets me all over again to watch him talk like that about her. But to carry the hate all these years, that's hard too. So until I got a life back here, it was all hatred. And that was eating me up.

So you have to let some of it go. Maybe it's the only way he can cope with what he's done. I don't know, but it's not right. It's hard to deal with that. Like to see her walk away from the house and the last time to see her, that's hard to deal with that. Like, to see her walk away from the house and the last time to see her, that's hard. I had that guilt every day. We had a big argument and I made her go to school.

If I hadn't made her, it might not have happened. She might have been safe. Guilt is etched like acid across the minds of all the victims' families I've worked with. Probably anyone who has experienced a sudden loss has become lost themselves in this terrain, but in cases like this, of people who go missing or who are murdered, it is almost always of a specific acuteness. If only they could have done something, said something, thought something different, it wouldn't have happened.

Their loved one would still be here. The moments before saying goodbye, that final argument, or fleeting last glimpse wouldn't be on endless replay, and their remaining existence wouldn't be spent in some kind of penitence, pushing people and their own lives away. This kind of guilt has stayed with Mary Ann all these years, playing out day and night. I have nightmares every single night, all night long, about trying to reach her and can't get to her to help her. And that's gonna be the rest of my life.

So I've seen psychiatrists, I've talked to counselors, and that will never go away. It's the guilt, and I feel that every day. So it's a struggle every day to get through it. And I feel that every day. So it's a struggle every day to get through it. I don't think Ringel will talk to Mary Ann. There's been no response to our missives, and his lawyer has not responded either. Mary Ann, after seeing some of the UC tapes, seems less interested in engaging with him,

but still I know would jump at any chance if it came up. Our thoughts turn to another matter constantly on her mind. It wasn't dug up back there. So the police said it was dug up but you went back there. Where we went? No, nothing's been dug up. That's back in on the other side of the park, side of the river there. It's all marsh and there's no way they dug it up.

Have OPP or police ever communicated with you about finding remains or anything like that? No, nothing. They said there was also helicopters with heat seeking thermal images and they didn't find nothing. Has there ever been cadaver dogs run through there? They said there was, I don't know. Yeah, it makes me wonder been cadaver dogs run through there? They said there was. I don't know.

Yeah, it makes me wonder about cadaver dogs and, you know, that area. There might be some, still some remnant that might be detected by a dog. That's something to consider as well. Yeah. The current owner of the property on the west side of the Sagin River where Ringel says he took Chrissie says police have not been back there for at least eight years. If that is true, then nobody has really been actively looking for Chrissie. So that's what we intend to do. films and most of all, true crime podcasts. But sometimes I just want to know more. I

want to go deeper. And that's where my podcast, Crime Story comes in. Every week I go behind the scenes with the creators of the best in true crime. I chat with the host of Skamanda, Teacher's Pet, Bone Valley, the list goes on. For the insider scoop, find Crime Story in your podcast app. Just heading down this trail at the riverside at the east side of the Saagin River out of Hanover Park. Lots of kingfishers in the trees. Those look like indigo buntings up there. The trail looks well-trodden at this point. As we continue here, the ferns and dames rocket flowers start to close in. Great day to look for a body. It's a few weeks later and I'm wading through underbrush in Hanover, Ontario. Every step I take is shadowed by what happened

here in the spring of 1993. Ringo met Chrissy on this path. He says he took her into the increasingly tangled woods ahead, then crossed the river. I want to see exactly where, because Marianne will soon be arriving at the park that's disappearing behind me, and before she gets here I want to make sure of where we'll be going. While she has been to the park and part way along this path, she says she's never been all the way down it. And later, she'll help search the area west of the Saugeen River for the first time for Chrissy. As you keep going here, the trail starts to divide. You can hear the town off to the left and to the right. On the west side is the property that we're

going to be searching today that we've been granted access to. The river bends off to the west and creates a peninsula, a large bend in the river that Ringel refers to in his conversations with police and undercover officers. He says they go right to the tip of the bend. It's very much an unused part of the trail here. I have to crouch down in order to get through a lot of ferns and raspberry brambles. Logs across the trail here.

They would have had to pick their way along here. If you go too fast you can trip. It's early June and the trail and entire area around me is lush and overgrown. When Ringo and Chrissy traveled the same path in May 1993 it would have been somewhat easier going. It's coming out to the tip here, so as you look across you can start to see a muddy bank on the other side. The Saugine River can flood in spring to varying degrees, and across the water I can see some sign of that. There are fewer trees, more grasses and mud, but the banks are high here and it doesn't seem like

the flood margin goes that deep. It's only about 30 feet before you'd hit a line of mature trees that would have trouble growing in a flooded area. It renews my hope that we might find some remainder of Chrissie. I come up to the tip and stop dead. Yeah, I think that's it there. I think that's the spot where they crossed. It's got to be. Both trails converge here. I think to continue this way you would start to go back down the other side of the peninsula. Right here. Right down here. Down this hill. And there's the water. Right down here, down this hill.

And there's the water. This is the place. This is the place where Ringel pushed Chrissy in. Ringel told undercover officers that he pushed Chrissie into the water and then went to the other western side of the river. She went downstream a little bit and I went across and hit the band. To get there I've brought a couple of blow up boats. Oh it's a nine bark huh?

I didn't notice it. It's all nine bark here. Yeah common nine bark. boats. My son Owen is here to help paddle them and some gear down to the tip of the peninsula where I just walked. This will be a temporary base camp of sorts. Owen's also brought a powerful magnet with him tied to a rope. We think it's worth trying dragging it along the bottom of the river nearby. Chrissy, according to Ringle, lost her glasses on the way across and also perhaps a bracelet. There's a needle in a haystack of needles.

Chance will find anything, but we try. We're looking in the river. We're looking at the sides of the river. We're looking at this current and trying to figure out where the current might have taken objects. This is happening in 1993 and we're in 2024 now and Chrissy will have been out here for that long. 31 years I think. That means that her remains could have been spread by water, by flood, by deterioration, by other animals, spreading them further up, away from the floodplain possibly, so that the margin of search is actually much broader and wider than where she initially was placed by wringle. Alright, so let's actually lift this boat down.

Yeah. This will be the boat that... Owen has lived these cases alongside me for years at the muddy banks of the Mississippi River for the Dean Moore case up in Thompson with Trevor Brown searching Holmes Lake for the remains of Adrian McNaughton and for Donnie Isitt on Dr. Noble's farm and now here today as we search for Chrissy. Ok, that's one boat. We head down the river. Ferns and flowers, bugs and birds. There is no shortage. Chrissy's favorite place is bursting with life.

Why is it that all these places are so fucking beautiful? I don't know. So we're just heading around the bend here. We've got Owen paddling in the front. We're towing another canoe. Yeah. So you see this opening and then down there by that branch down there? That's where I think they he started the cross with Chrissy. So the search area is really all around us. I think we should just go along the shoreline.

Ringel says he pushed Chrissy into the water and she drifted downstream a bit. He says he then jumped in after her and brought her to the western shore, somewhere a short distance downriver on the other side. Let's just see where the current takes us. Let's figure out the course. There's a good ledge here to get stuff stuck under. I think you could sort of get it under there. There you go.

On the end of the magnet are clumps of what looks like iron filings, common in rivers and not remarkable. We're not expecting to find anything. OPP had divers in the Sauguin River for a couple of days in spring 2005. They too were looking for Chrissie's glasses, but according to court documents, they were searching at closest, about 400 meters upstream of where Ringel tells police he crossed the river with Chrissy, the spot where Owen and I are, right now. I thought the morning warbblers around here.

I can really hear that morning warbler now. I wonder what they thought he was mourning or who it was. Uncannily that morning warbler is right where I think Chrissy probably drifted to. I think I see some police tape over there. As we float downriver from where I think Chrissy entered the water something catches my eye. A tree on my left and up the steep embankment on the western side of the sauging. A tree with a lone red OPP tape tied to one of its lower branches. Some distant time ago, I don't know when or for how long, they were here.

I wonder what this is. Put it inside the boat? Curved piece of metal. Curved piece of metal. Ooh, that's interesting. Does that look like it could have been from glasses? Rim of glasses. Owen has pulled up the magnet to find an old rusty nail

and something else, a curved piece of metal. Our excitement and wishful thinking wanted to be a piece of Chrissie's glasses, but I suspect it may be nothing. It really does look like a piece from a pair of glasses, doesn't it? You think so? I don't know, it's obviously impossible to say, and wishful thinking to say it's from

glasses. Okay, so we're almost ready to get out of here. Time to get back down the trail to Hanover Park. Mary Ann will soon be there after checking into her hotel, but someone else who will be helping us has just arrived. Hello. Hi. How are you guys?

We're good. Kim Cooper and Pauline Sundman have arrived with their dogs, Recce and Taz, cadaver dogs that will be part of the search today. How's it been going since I saw you last, Kim? Good, good, good. Busy? This year is the, we were just saying, probably the busiest year we've had. Is that right?

Yeah. Kim and Pauline have volunteered on many searches like this, both live search and for human remains, including on SKS cases, and our hope is that they might find something where police searches did not. Kim wonders what I know about the prospective search area. I have a map that they drew, but I mean the area is the area, right? It's not just, it's been what, over 30 years, right? So spread, other animals, floodplain. I mean, other animals could have taken bone anywhere, right?

So within whatever you're... you must have some kind of matrix for measuring that, right? Animals don't go far. Yeah. If Ringel is being truthful about where he took Chrissy in 1993, her remains could still be in this area. The floodplain doesn't seem to be consistent or even that high, and if, as Cooper says, other animals do not spread remains that far, we might have a slim chance, and it's one that Marianne is willing to take.

Hi, how are you? I'm all right. Good to see you. Thanks for coming. Marianne has driven here from her home a few hours away. She looks tired but determined. Pauline and Kim, this is Marianne. Hi I'm Kim. Nice to meet you. And today I'm not expecting miracles but you know feel free to wander around in the woods after the

dogs if you want but you know if you want to just kind of stay put in the shade that's fine too. We begin our walk out to where I have placed the boats to make the crossing today. The likely point where Ringel says he and Chrissy went. So we're coming up on the trail entrance here. And did police ever bring you out here before? No. So no one has ever brought you on this actual entrance here. And did police ever bring you out here before? No. So no one has ever brought you on this actual trail here? No.

As we make our way out, it's tough going for Mary Ann. How are you doing so far? Good. There's lots of places to hide or that nobody would see her in this. Okay, now be careful here here there's a big log. Let me grab my arm there. Okay that's good. You're good. Watch out I slipped right around here and face planted this morning. She's been here before though right? She would have known the area he certainly knew the area yeah so right around here is where you start to see that other shore yeah so we're

coming out this is the very tip here you have to go really low though down here it's a really really narrow little trail you think you can come through there trail. You think you can come through there? Yep. Well this is where it gets slippery. Yeah. There you go. Marianne and the dog handlers hunch down almost to their knees, following me on the final segment of trail that leads to the water's edge. So this is the place where I think they probably got to. Yeah, it makes sense.

And I think the red police tab is on that tree there. You can see it if you come over this way a bit. Yeah, just on this side. And she drifted down a bit. The flow probably wouldn't have been much bigger than this at the time. So, that log down there would be the last place. I would say no more than 30 feet in. So if we're over here, like you say, 30 feet in or so,

like any kind of animal scatter should only be 100 meters, not much more. Yeah. Ringle, he was not implying that they were that far in. So I would say if you started that log and you push... Okay, so I'll take the dog and Pauline over first, just so she can get to work. I retrieve the boat and paddle it to where everyone is waiting. I'll shuttle groups over in pairs across the section of water Ringel says he and Chrissie went through.

Alright, you think the dog's going to like getting in here? Pauline and Taz get into the boat and we're soon on the other side. So I'm going to go along the shoreline, then I'll work my way back. So I'm going to go along the shoreline, then I'll work my way back. And then when I feel I'm finished, I'll come back. Okay, and we'll just be looking around in here. Okay. Great. Good luck.

I returned to pick up Mary Ann. She's afraid of water. Chrissy too would have been afraid here and wasn't a strong swimmer. Alright, just settle in for this journey across the river. It'll be a slow trip. When was the last time you were on that trail, Mary Ann? I didn't go quite that far but it was that weekend. Meaning that weekend when Chrissy disappeared in 1993. That weekend, yep.

So that weekend you traveled that trail but not that far. Just not that far. And then after that you would not have come down that trail again? No I didn't. No. We get out of the boat on the other side of the river where we believe Ringel crossed with Chrissy. Marianne has never been here before and ventures deep into the bush. Oh, oh. Shit. Shit, sorry. Here. Give me your hand on there.

Marianne's leg has disappeared into a deep hole in the ground. I help her out and she's okay. The ferns and grasses are up to our shoulders and we can't see the ground. Walking is a process of feeling like we're walking on a field and we're walking on a field I help her out and she's okay. The ferns and grasses are up to our shoulders and

we can't see the ground. Walking is a process of feeling with tips of toes first, then proceeding. It's a nearly impossible task. There you go, step right over that Marianne. Sorry I should have held on to you there. A bit of a clearing here so that's a bit of a relief for you. Here you go. How's that? Okay. Don't go too close to the edge.

I walk around on my own for a while and can hear the ring of Taz. At one point, Taz comes up to me and I cannot even see her. She's less than a foot away. The overgrowth of ferns is too thick and I come to a point of recognition. This is too difficult. I return to Marianne in the clearing. So I think we should just go back to the beach myself because it just seems pretty... I mean we can keep wandering around and hope that we hit the right right spot but be careful. Here's that hole.

There's another hole there. We return to the beach after trudging back along our trail through the underbrush. Through my vertical loft going through there. Oh you got a little bit of dizziness now? Yeah. Yeah. Going through there. Oh, you got a little bit of dizziness now? Yeah. Yeah. Marianne's fall makes her feel dizzy. We pause to catch our breath and await the searchers' return.

What do you think that Chrissy would be doing now? What she would be doing is probably have her own children, her own life, and she'd be out camping with them being summer. She loved to camp. We can hear the bells and Pauline and Taz suddenly appear out of seemingly nowhere. So there was a little area that she sort of perked up but she didn't indicate. You recorded that spot on there? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, good. How far down did you go that way? Well I think I went as far as you pointed out there. That log? Yeah, that log. Okay. Yeah.

So it's pretty dense in there. It's very dense, yeah. Yeah. The better time to come is like a month and a half earlier. I'm gonna probably have to come back, walk the whole area like next year kind of thing. Or even in the fall. In the fall, yeah. When everything dies down. Kim Cooper confirms that she and Recce will not continue the search today. Conditions are not right. I mean I've got a lot of trust and taz I don't think it has to be worked again. Okay. I'll revisit this place at some point. You know, it's too bad that it's so high, but I think smell is smell. I mean, if anything, the ferns are going to keep the smell down. Which isn't necessarily

good. We like it up because then it moves around and the dogs can pick it up from further away because it's being carried by the wind. If it's being smothered, it's they have to be right on top of it. Yeah, okay. that's that's too bad. Thanks for trying that. I may go try and do a little bit of metal detecting now but I'll probably get out of here as well soon but I think I can get all that stuff over here myself and thanks so much. Yeah no problem. Kim and Pauline have agreed to come back here and I'll be here when it happens. That's when we had to go. If you go too early though, then it's too wet and tough to get around, muddy.

If you go in the fall, you just have to go before freeze. Back at the hotel with Marianne for a debrief. Back at the hotel with Mary Ann for a debrief. It was hard going through there. And to try and find anything there would be difficult. Yeah, it was tough going. But that's okay. I mean, we tried. That's part of the reason we tried it,

is because we wanted to try. I trust the dogs, I trust the handlers, so I think that we have to kind of live with that. It also shows me that if that area had been searched, because I went up and down a path like four times, and that path was easily discernible, you could easily see that path to the grass. So Ringo went back the next day. They both walked to this spot, somehow went to the spot. He forced Chrissy, but she went there with her and would have trampled the grass too. So that's three different trips or four different trips in the same area, I feel like she would have been found. Yeah, they didn't search.

They would have found her. The west side of the Sagin was not searched in 1993 after Chrissie disappeared, according to records. Yeah. I mean, even Pauline, you could see where she'd been after one walkthrough. I don't know about sort of five days later, but a couple of days later, you would have been able to see that trail.

Exactly. And I told them, I know she's there. I could feel it. And that just makes me not angry, but just kind of, it's unfortunate, right? And these are things you have to hold inside and accept. As you know, you're an expert at accepting, but not accepting, right? And you have to hold it inside and you have to accept that it's there, or else you won't be able to function.

You have to be able to manage and survive with this stuff inside you. And you've done that, commendably. Yeah, I had to do it if I wouldn't have, I'd have wondered. You know, yeah, it's just something I have to do. Yeah. I hope you have a safe journey home. And, you know, I wish we'd be able to say that we found Chrissy today but we'll see you.

Thanks for all your help. Like I said, without you doing that, nothing would have happened. Well it does it feels like something happened and the work was worthwhile anyways and you're in it I mean you you're the reason that we did it right? Alright. Okay. Thank you so much. Yeah, okay. Take care. Bye. that we did it right okay yeah okay take care I say my goodbyes and head back to the site to do some end-of-day metal

detecting and to gather all the gear and my thoughts if you fight the thing that you hate or that you're afraid of or that you can't solve, that's when you get the problems. You have to accept. You accept it and you keep trying and you move on and it's part of you. It's okay. She's part of this entire place now. She's not just in one place, which was her favorite place. It's cold comfort but that's okay. It's okay.

I find nothing with the detector. In fact, I find that it's more of a distraction, but this ridiculously beeping device is a good reminder. We're here to survive, but also to do more than that. And that is what we will do. You gotta keep trying. You gotta keep trying. I don't think you need to accept it. I think you just have to keep trying. I don't think you need to accept it. I think you just have to keep trying. This is the final planned episode in the case of Christine Herron. For more investigations, check out the past seasons of Someone Knows Something. From a deadly bomb hidden inside a flashlight to two teenagers killed by the KKK, there are eight seasons of Someone Knows Something you can binge listen to right now, wherever

you get your podcasts. If you want to watch my original 2011 TV documentary, visit the CBC Podcasts channel on YouTube, or hit the link in this week's show notes. Someone Knows Something is hosted, written and produced by me, David Rigeon. The series is also produced by Katie Swires. Sound Design by Evan Kelly. Natalia Ferguson is our transcriber. Emily Cannell is our digital producer.

Chris Oak is our story editor. Our executive producer is Cecil Fernandes. Our podcast art was designed by Ben Shannon. Our cross-promo producer is Amanda Cox. Our video producer is Evan Agard. Special thanks to Dave Moody and Sean Moorman. Tanya Springer is the senior manager. Araf Nurani is the director.

And Leslie Merklinger is the executive director of CBC Podcasts. Our music is by Key Witness. Rock into the dirt And it'll end And it fills your pain And I can't Can't let you in the tail Don't look back Every road we take Step back home

Blinded by pain Take it to yourself I'll never leave you baby, I said I'm forgetting you all For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.