True North True Crime

In March 1993, Debra Kayla Entwistle was murdered in her home in Fort McMurray, Alberta. Her former common-law partner Leonard Neveu confessed, led investigators to her remains, and admitted in an Edmonton courtroom that he killed her. He refused to plead guilty to second degree murder. The Attorney General’s office rejected a plea to manslaughter because the evidence was too strong. Parts of Debr...

In March 1993, Debra Kayla Entwistle was weeks away from leaving Fort McMurray for good. She had spent years trying to escape a violent man, and she had finally done it. Her father had an apartment waiting for her in Vernon, British Columbia. She never made it. On the morning of March 24th, her twelve-year-old daughter Stephanie left for school and made her mother's coffee before she went. When sh...

Karen Tessier was 57 years old when she was last seen on July 9th, 2024, in Fort Nelson, British Columbia. Five days later her vehicle was found burned in a remote area outside of town. She has not been found. No arrest has been made. In this episode we speak with Karen's mother Elizabeth, an elder of Fort Nelson First Nation, and with Connie, a community member who spent months searching for Kare...

In August 1982, David William Shearing murdered six members of the Johnson and Bentley families while they were on a camping trip near Wells Gray Provincial Park in British Columbia. George and Edith Bentley, their daughter Jackie Johnson, her husband Bob Johnson, and the couple’s two young daughters Janet, thirteen, and Karen, eleven, were killed in one of the most disturbing crimes in Canadian h...

In this episode, we speak with the family of missing 22-year-old Liam Toman — his father Chris, mother Kathleen, and stepmother Lara. Liam disappeared during a ski trip to Mont-Tremblant, Quebec, in the early morning hours of February 2, 2025. He was last seen walking back toward his hotel in the resort village after a night out with friends, but he never made it back. Since then, his family has b...

Hours after being convicted of assaulting his wife Bailey McCourt, James Plover walked out of a Kelowna courthouse on existing bail. Within three hours, she was dead, killed in a parking lot in broad daylight in front of witnesses. She was 32 years old and a mother of two. This is Part 2 of a two-part series on the Bailey McCourt case. In this episode we cover the July 4th attack, the questions it...

Bailey McCourt was a 32-year-old mother of two from Kelowna, British Columbia. In June of 2024, her husband, James Plover, assaulted her inside their home, grabbing her by the throat and threatening to kill her. Bailey called 911. Plover was charged with assault by choking and uttering threats. She cooperated with police, sat through a trial, and waited nearly a year for a verdict. On July 4th, 20...

Sebastian Moore was seventeen years old when he was stabbed and killed in Terrace, British Columbia on the night of November 26th, 2023. A youth was taken into custody but after more than a year of investigation, Crown Counsel declined to approve charges, determining the incident met the legal definition of self-defence. Sebastian was a member of Kitselas Nation along the Skeena River in northwest...

UPDATE: Since the release of this episode, Deeanna Erickson has been located. Calgary Police have stated that the case is non-criminal and have not released further details. Her sister has shared that Deeanna has passed away. We extend our condolences to Shelby and to all those who knew and loved Deeanna. -- On the night of  June 6th, 2025 , 31-year-old  Deeanna Erickson  board...

On December 18, 2022, a mass shooting event inside Bellaria Tower II in Vaughan, Ontario left five people dead. Francesco Villi, a 73-year-old resident of the Bellaria condominium at 9235 Jane Street, carried out the attack after years of escalating legal disputes with the condo board. Within minutes, five residents were killed: Rita Camilleri, Vittorio Panza, Russell Manock, Helen “Lorraine” Mano...

In this episode, we examine the 1984 murder of 13-year-old Candace Derksen in Winnipeg. Candace vanished on her way home from school in November of that year. Weeks later, her body was discovered in a storage shed, bound and left in the cold. We trace the investigation, the arrest and trial, and the acquittal that continues to shape how this case is remembered. Along the way, we look at how the mu...

In the summer of 2020, 20-year-old Shane Eric James Smith vanished in Calgary. He was last seen on June 6, and within days police believed he had been shot and killed by a friend at a southeast Calgary residence. In the weeks that followed, the Calgary Police Service charged Ian Charles Abercrombie with homicide, and two others with offences related to the handling of Shane’s body, which has never...

In this previously TNTC+ episode, we sit down with Gillian Millam, former Metropolitan Police officer from the U.K. and current Executive Director of British Columbia Crime Stoppers. Gillian began working with Greater Victoria Crime Stoppers in 2015 and went on to coordinate one of the province’s most successful programs before stepping into her current provincial role. We discuss how the program...

In July 1976, a young gas station attendant named Michael Carmen was shot and killed during a late-night robbery in Albuquerque, New Mexico. His death seemed destined to become another unsolved case in a city struggling with rising crime and few witnesses willing to speak. But one Canadian-born detective, Greg MacAleese, refused to let it fade away. What began as his search for answers would lead...

In this previously TNTC+ exclusive episode, we dive into the homicide case of Shabir Niazi out of Ajax Ontario. Shabir Niazi, who was 22 years old at the time, was found shot to death in the garage of a home on Roosevelt Avenue. The case drew significant attention due to a series of legal proceedings, including debates over the admissibility of certain evidence and the handling of Crime Stoppers t...

On this Christmas Day episode of True North True Crime, we’re joined by Madelayne Klein and Jordan Bonaparte from The Canadian Gothic for a year-end roundtable. Together, we reflect on the cases from 2025 that stayed with us, the shifts and trends we’ve seen across the true crime space, and how emerging tools like AI are beginning to influence storytelling and journalism. We also look ahead to wha...

It was a quiet Monday afternoon in Burnaby, British Columbia, when police were called to a residential street near Alpha Secondary School. A passerby had noticed a parked vehicle and looked inside — making a discovery that would devastate two families and spark a complex investigation. The bodies of 31-year-old  Keisha Garie  and 30-year-old  Umair Kasim  of Coquitlam were foun...

On October 3rd, 1984, nine-year-old Christine Jessop disappeared from her home in Queensville, Ontario. Her case became one of the most highly scrutinized investigations in Canadian history, marked by a wrongful conviction, decades of unanswered questions, and a search for justice that stretched across generations. In this episode, we revisit Christine’s story and speak with Jo Virgo, Executive Pr...

This episode was originally a TNTC+ bonus episode. In April 2006, a 20-year-old man drove from Nova Scotia to Maine with a chilling plan. Armed with names and addresses from the state’s sex offender registry, he hunted down two men, Joseph Gray and William Elliott, in a series of calculated attacks. What compelled this seemingly ordinary young man to cross borders and commit such violent crimes? I...

In this previously TNTC+ bonus episode, we're taking you inside a world few people truly understand — the work of cadaver search dogs and their handlers. We’re joined by Jason McMillan, Vice President and K9 Handler with Canadian Cadaver Canines — a volunteer-based team that assists in searches for missing persons across Canada. Jason and his cadaver dog, Osiris, bring compassion, skill, and unwav...

On a cold December night in 1962, two men were led through the echoing halls of Toronto’s Don Jail. Beneath their feet, a trapdoor waited. Minutes later, Arthur Lucas and Ronald Turpin became the last people ever executed in Canadian history. In this special Halloween episode, we step back into that chilling night — and the crimes that brought both men to the gallows. Through archival records, pre...

Seven-year-old Wayne Mallette vanished on the deserted grounds of Toronto’s Canadian National Exhibition on September 15, 1956. Within days, police zeroed in on 14-year-old Ron Moffatt, extracting a confession during a parent- and lawyer-free interrogation and securing a juvenile conviction—while the real predator, Peter Woodcock, remained free to kill again. In this episode, we trace the investig...

On the night of October 12, 1983, 17-year-old Donna Jean Awcock was babysitting for a neighbour in London, Ontario. When her shift ended, she set out for a short walk — but she never made it home. The next morning, October 13, Donna’s body was found near the Thames River by the Fanshawe Dam. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled. For forty years, her case has remained unsolved. In this epi...

In January 2024, 52-year-old Mathew McGrath went missing from Carleton Place, Ontario. For four months his family searched desperately, until his body was discovered in the Mississippi River that May. The coroner ruled his cause of death as drowning, but the manner was left undetermined. Police stated no foul play was suspected and considered the case closed. For Mathew’s sister Melissa, the searc...

It was the early hours of August 3rd, 2001, in Edmonton, Alberta, when fire crews responded to a dumpster blaze behind a central apartment building. Once the flames were out, they made a horrifying discovery — the burned remains of a young woman. For nearly two weeks, investigators worked to find out who she was. They canvassed hundreds of apartments and narrowed their search to a short list of mi...