Province increasing awareness during Missing Persons Week

The province is raising awareness of Emily’s case and 121 other missing persons cases in Saskatchewan during Missing Persons Week from May 3 to May 9. There are 90 men and 32 women missing, including another member of Myrna’s family.

“We have been really dedicated and focused on the Cody search in the last four years,” Myrna explained.

Cody Wolfe was 17 when he disappeared on April 29, 2011 on the Muskowekwan First Nation. Cody was at his grandmother’s and left around 10:30 p.m. to walk to a friend’s house but he never arrived. RCMP and search and rescue teams scoured the area and every spring, summer, and fall his family goes back out to the area to search.

“There is a certain heaviness around and our carefree laughter is no longer there,” Myrna said.

“(There is) lots of depression, sadness, frustration because we just can’t seem to locate either of them and there’s huge frustration associated with that.”

Myrna lives in Saskatoon and works with Iskwewuk E-wichiwitochik (Women Walking Together) to raise awareness around the issue of missing people and give support to their families. She said support is critical especially for long term and historical cases.

“The first three or four or five days you are thinking we are going to find these people, they are out there, they may have fallen or whatever. Then the days go by and it becomes two weeks, a month, two months,” she said.

“Ongoing support and care for the family is absolutely required for people to check in with them, how they are doing, and if they need anything.”

During the yearly searches for answers about her family members, Myrna said they have been lucky to work with RCMP, the Montreal Lake Cree Nation Search and Rescue, Carry the Kettle First Nation Search and Rescue, and a retired RCMP officer. But she said at some point, it ends up being the families doing the searches on their own.

“Once the RCMP are done and the provincial search and rescue organization… the family still needs to search,” she said.

Myrna said searching costs time and emotional stress. But it also costs families money.

“If we look at all the expenses we’ve had (searching for Cody), it’s probably looking close to around the $80,000 mark. Some of it’s from family pocket, some contributions by different individuals and organizations, and of course the First Nations,” she said.

“Who plans? Nobody plans for this kind of expense. We have to get these funds from somewhere.”

Myrna added that relationships with police and RCMP are also critical, she is meeting with officers in Punnichy on Thursday to plan for the spring search for Cody.

That’s a sentiment echoed by Detective Cst. Chris Harris with the Missing Persons detachment of the Saskatoon Police Service. In Saskatoon, his detachment investigated over 800 files relating to short-term missing persons last year.

“When I come in the morning I review every missing persons file that has come in overnight,” he said.

The files are predominantly young girls, with 447 being filed for females between 12 and 18 years old; 224 for male youth of the same age; and 140 for adults. Harris linked the difference to a larger number of girls in care.

“About 85 per cent of our missing people… are in some sort of care from social services,” he said pointing to group homes or foster homes.

“Every missing persons file is treated the same. It might be a name we recognize but they are all categorized as a missing person until we have information.”

In just 2015, a male youth went missing 13 times, eight lasted only overnight before being located. Another youth had been missing for at least 47 of the first 112 days of the year, not including being found in the same night.

“The main message is that it’s a community thing just like anything else. Co-operation is key,” Harris said.

“If we have the co-operation of the family it makes it a lot easier to ensure these kids are safe.”

The last missing persons file that Saskatoon Police do not have a conclusion to is Karina Wolfe.

Karina was last seen on July 2, 2010 when she disappeared at the age of 20. She was last seen by family on the 800 block of Appleby Drive getting into a grey Corvette of a male acquaintance around 6 p.m. and investigators believe she may have later been dropped off in the area of 20th Street West and Avenue H South.

“There’s only a handful of unsolved long term cases ,” Harris said.

“We don’t want anybody ever to fall through the cracks… We don’t want complacency to set in just because someone has run a lot of times. It’s still treated just as important as the first time runner until we know otherwise.”

The full list of missing persons can be found on the Saskatchewan Association of Chiefs of Police website.

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On Twitter; @princealbertnow

by Kelly Malone

Province increasing awareness during Missing Persons Week

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