Frustration with lack of progress in murder investigation

It has been five years since Jackie Crazybull, a 44-year-old Blackfoot woman, was stabbed to death in an apparently random attack on the streets of Calgary during the Stampede and still there is no closure for her family.

“We are tired of waiting for answers,” said Sandra Manyfeathers, a younger sister who says she and many members of the family have been severely affected by Jackie’s murder. “We have been patient with the police, letting them do their job. But we haven’t heard anything from them in a long time.”

No charges have been filed and the case is in the hands of the Unsolved Homicides Unit of the Calgary Police Service.

Crazybull had gone out with cousin Kirk Steinhauer to get something to eat on July 11, 2007. “A car pulled up and asked them for directions,” Manyfeathers recounts what she was told. “My cousin said ‘never mind them,’ but my sister went to the vehicle. She was giving them directions and they stabbed her, and then they drove off.”

Despite Steinhauer’s first-aid efforts, Crazybull bled to death by a bus bench near 17th Avenue S.W. and 11th Street, becoming Calgary’s 15th homicide of the year. Within the hour, four other people were stabbed in similar attacks after being engaged in conversation by the attackers. None of the victims knew each other, and none of the other injuries were fatal.

That’s where the questions begin for Crazybull’s family.

“There were witnesses,” Manyfeathers said. “And there is video footage from the Mac’s Store across the street.”

There were even pictures and names published in the local media of four men, she says.

“I’m not sure about the videotape,” said Staff Sgt. Grant Miller of the Unsolved Homicides Unit.  “In all of our old cold case files, our unsolved files, in a lot of situations the police have persons of interest, and the problem is the hurdles you have to jump over, but we need a few more pieces of the puzzle before we can lay charges.”

He confirms that Crazybull’s stabbing was one of five that night.
“We believe the same person is responsible for all of them, and that includes Jackie’s situation,” Miller said. “Our best information will come from the bad guys, and they are the people who need to call us. Or someone who was at the scene, that’s who we need to step forward and give us what we need. If we were to receive a phone call, we’d be all over it.”

Manyfingers says in the early days after the crime, CPS treated the family with respect and kindness, assuring her “they were working hard on the case.” Members of CPS even participated in the Justice for Jackie Walk the family organized a year after Crazybull’s death.

“After that, I never got hold of them and nobody got hold of me. We never heard anything more from the police,” Manyfingers said.

That doesn’t mean CPS isn’t working on the case, says Miller. “I can say with good conscience that we are working very hard.”
However, he would not divulge any details or comment on where the investigation may be going.

Lack of communication is one aspect of an investigation families often complain about, says Muriel Stanley-Venne, of the Institute for the Advancement of Aboriginal Women.

Stanley-Venne gave closing remarks in Edmonton during the Oct. 6 Sisters in Spirit Rally and Stolen Sisters Awareness Walk. “(The police) have all kinds of reasons why they don’t disclose things to the family, and they could do a lot better.”

The Justice for Jackie Walk was held in Calgary on Oct. 8, just four days after the Sisters in Spirit walks and vigils, which take place each year across the country organized by the Native Women’s Association of Canada. According to NWAC figures, there are over 600 Aboriginal women who have been murdered or gone missing in Canada over the last 30 years.

April Eve Wiberg, with Stolen Sisters in Edmonton, would like to see the case resolved.

“Jackie never should have been a victim,” she said. “These guys (the perpetrators) are out there walking around and they need to be held accountable. Justice has to be served.”

At the same time, Wiberg sees reason for hope, pointing to the work undertaken by Project KARE, an RCMP-led unit mandated to investigate Alberta cases of†murdered and missing persons, whose vulnerable circumstances may have resulted in their disappearance. She says Calgary and Edmonton police services are beginning to work together with the RCMP and Project Kare.
 “It takes time to get people united, but once they are, incredible things can happen. It’s only bound that positive change will happen,” Wiberg said.

The Crazybull case remains with the CPS.

“We have spoken to Project Kare. We know them and work with them when our paths cross. But … Project Kare isn’t in a position to investigate Jackie’s file, it remains with us,” Miller said.

Photo caption: This banner of Jacqueline Crazybull, with her children, was painted by Jesse Gouchey as part of Gouchey and Xstine Cook’s film about murdered and missing Aboriginal women, which ran as part of the imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival in Toronto this year.