Dark Poutine - True Crime and Dark History

Episode 281: On the night of Saturday, October 25th, 1857, in Beaver Lake, a part of Simond’s Parish in St John County, a heinous crime was committed unlike anything ever seen in New Brunswick up to that point. Sure, there had been murders and arsons, but those were often the result of heated arguments or drunken brawls. But this crime was different. It’s hard to believe that anyone in New Brunswi...

Episode 280: In the early morning hours of July 8, 2019, Vancouver Island RCMP launched a manhunt for two inmates who had escaped from William Head, a minimum security federal institution in Metchosin, south of Victoria. The two men, James Lee Busch and Zachary Armitage had walked away from William Head the day before. The fugitives were arrested on July 9 after an off-duty RCMP officer spotted th...

Episode 279: In Quebec City, on October 21, 2004, Dario Gallese got an alarming phone call from his younger brother, Eustachio Gallese. In the call, Eustachio admitted to killing his girlfriend, Chantale Deschesnes, 32, and, following his brother's advice, contacted the police to report the crime. Eustachio was arrested, charged, and convicted of the second-degree murder of Chantale. In late 2006,...

Episode 278: In this episode, we plunge into the perplexing saga of Grace Marks and James McDermott. Their story, a blend of mystery and controversy, revolves around the savage murders of wealthy Richmond Hill farmer Thomas Kinnear and his housekeeper, Nancy Montgomery, in 1843. This tale continues to ignite debates about guilt, innocence, and the essence of criminality. We'll lay out a tangled we...

Episode 277: On January 26, 2012, Jo Anne Alexander called 911 from her residence in Richmond, B.C., pleading for help and mentioning that she had ingested sleeping pills. Upon arrival, police found Jo Anne and her husband, John Alexander, in their bed with their deceased family dog. John was dead and had suffered blunt-force injuries. His death was ruled a homicide. Jo Anne was rushed to a nearby...

Episode 276: On March 27, 2020, Jacob Sansom, 39, and his uncle, Maurice Cardinal, 57, both Métis, went hunting in Glendon, Alberta. They later began driving along Range Road 484, where they were mistakenly suspected of planning a burglary by Roger Bilodeau, a white property owner. Bilodeau, 58, and his 16-year-old son, Joseph, gave chase, reaching speeds up to 150 km/h. Another son, Anthony Bilod...

This historical, true crime podcast hosted by Kru Williams from History Television's hit original series Deadman’s Curse: The Legend of the Lost Gold investigates the curse and legend surrounding the lost gold mine of Pitt Lake. On their quest they're joined by members of the Stó:lō and Katzie First Nations, historians and cultural experts of diverse backgrounds, as they sort fact from fiction and...

Episode 275: On May 8, 1984, a man with a beard, dressed in Canadian Forces camouflage attire and wearing a beret, entered the studios of CJRP, a radio station in Quebec City. Employees at the station noticed the man had a knife secured to his leg. The man approached the assistant to radio host André Arthur’s assistant, presented her with an envelope while introducing himself as “Mr. D.” and promp...

Episode 274: Trina Hunt, a 48-year-old woman from Port Moody, B.C., was reported missing on the evening of January 18, 2021. Her husband, Iain Hunt, claimed to have seen her at her home that morning. Her whereabouts remained unknown for weeks despite extensive search efforts by authorities and volunteers. Tragically, Trina’s body was discovered near Hope, B.C., South of Silver Creek on March 29, 2...

Episode 273: On August 15, 2009, the mutilated body of Jasmine Fiore, a 28-year-old Playboy model and aspiring actress, was found stuffed into a suitcase and discarded in a dumpster in Buena Park, California. The investigation quickly led to her husband, Ryan Jenkins, a Canadian real estate investor and former contestant on the reality TV show “Megan Wants a Millionaire.” As the investigation prog...

Episode 272: Peter Vasilievich Verigin, also known as “Lordly,” was a highly respected and influential leader among the Doukhobors. These Doukhobors had migrated to Canada in 1899, seeking a new life and religious freedom. Verigin was pivotal in guiding and inspiring them to create a strong and united community based on their religious beliefs. However, tragedy struck in 1924, casting a dark shado...

Episode 271: In this episode, we’re providing updates on two historical shows that are now recently solved by way of updates to DNA technology and genetic genealogy. In the first half of this episode, we have recent updates to show 130, where we learned of the brutal rape and murder of a Montreal teen, Sharron Prior. We can finally answer the question posed in that episode’s title, “Who Killed Sha...

Episode 270: Having just set out from Quebec City the previous day, in the early hours of May 29, 1914, the passenger ship Empress of Ireland sank in the Saint Lawrence River near Rimouski, Quebec. She was on a return trip to Liverpool, England and due to heavy fog, the ship collided with the Norwegian collier SS Storstad.  Just two years after the Titanic calamity in international waters off the...

Episode 269: On April 12, 1991, a group of teens attended a woodland party near Oromocto, New Brunswick, involving alcohol and drugs, including LSD. Pamela Gail Bischoff, 14, and William Wayne Dale (Billy) Stillman, 17, left the gathering together, marking the last sighting of Pamela Bischoff alive. Stillman returned home later, wet from the thighs down, cold, shaking, and sporting a cut above his...

Episode 268: On November 18, 1987, Jay Cook, 20, and Tanya Van Cuylenborg, 18, a young couple from Vancouver Island, went on a road trip to Seattle, Washington. Unfortunately, they were never seen alive again. Their bodies were discovered weeks later in separate locations. Tanya had been raped, shot, and left in a ditch in Skagit County. Jay was found strangled in the woods near Monroe, about 60 m...

Episode 267: On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants attacked the US embassy in Tehran, Iran, taking 66 diplomats and staff members hostage. Remarkably, six diplomats managed to slip away unnoticed. These individuals were Robert Anders, Cora Lijek, Mark Lijek, Joseph Stafford, Kathleen Stafford, and Lee Schatz. Schatz sought refuge at the Swedish embassy, while the others went to the British embass...

In October 2008, the friends and family of 38-year-old Johnny Altinger were worried. Although emails and social media messages had indicated Johnny had run away on the spur of the moment with an unknown woman he’d just met, things didn’t add up. The messages did not have the same feel as Johnny’s typical fare, and he wasn’t known for his spontaneity. Police had already spoken with the tenant at th...

Episode 265: In October 2008, 38-year-old Johnny Altinger was looking for love online and, thinking he’d found it, was lured to his death in a dingy south Edmonton, Alberta garage. Johnny believed he would meet the girl of his dreams, but a Star Wars and Dexter-Morgan-obsessed serial killer wannabe and 29-year-old amateur filmmaker named Mark Andrew Twitchell awaited him in the garage’s darkness....

Episode 264: In Montreal, Quebec on the evening of April 10, 1734, a fire broke out in the home of Madame de Francheville on Rue Saint-Paul and quickly spread throughout the city. Raging for hours, it destroyed over 46 buildings, primarily residential homes, and the Hôtel-Dieu, a hospital that provided medical care to soldiers and people who were too poor to care for at home. There were rumours th...

Episode 263: Approaching the week of 4/20, cannabis enthusiasts worldwide are preparing for a unique celebration. However, it’s essential to acknowledge the dark history of cannabis prohibition in Canada and the USA. The criminalization of cannabis wasn’t based on scientific evidence of its harmful effects or widespread health concerns but was fuelled by moral panic, racism, and xenophobia. It ser...

Episode 262: In early March of 1946, John Dick, a 39-year-old streetcar conductor in Hamilton, Ontario, disappeared. Weeks later, five local children found John’s torso on the city’s outskirts — his head and limbs were missing. Suspicion soon fell on John’s wife, Evelyn, who was arrested and charged with the murder. The pair had had a whirlwind courtship and had been married only months before Joh...

Episode 261: On September 5th, 1998, between 11:00 and 11:30 pm, Brianne Ruth Wolgram was last seen at the 7-11 store in Revelstoke, BC., in the company of three young females whose identities are unknown. Five days later, Brianne’s abandoned car was discovered 30 km south of Revelstoke, towards the Akolkolex Falls & River, on Echo Lake Road. Inside the car was her wallet, driver’s license and $20...

Episode 260: Canada played an important role in the Cold War, a period of intense geopolitical tension and rivalry between the Western powers and the Soviet Union that lasted from the end of World War II in 1945 until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. As a member of the Western Bloc and a close ally of the United States, Canada was involved in a wide range of Cold War activities, including...

Episode 259: After she’d been missing only one day, on the evening of May 7th, 2002, the body of 14-year-old Jessica Grimard was discovered by her father in a stream within a wooded area near her home in Rivière-des-Prairies, a suburban borough on the eastern tip of the city of Montreal, Quebec. As her killer had placed Jessica in the water, washing away evidence, there was not much for the cops t...

Episode 258: On the morning of February 20, 1989, stay-at-home mother of two Janice Faye Johnson was found unconscious, gravely injured and barely clinging to life at the foot of a flight of basement stairs in the Shelburne, Nova Scotia home she shared with her family, Clayton Norman Johnson and daughters Darla and Dawn. Even though she was still alive when she was found by a neighbour, who called...