In nineteen eighty nine, the body of a Canadian nurse was found bound and strangled outside of Vancouver, capping off nearly seven years of terrifying harassment and stalking. Despite over one hundred reported incidents, including threatening phone calls, break ins, and physical attacks, the police found no evidence of the
alleged stalker. Now to this day, debates ray je On over whether the victim was truly being stalked and tormented, where if her death was the result of her own hand, making her case one of Canada's most chilling mysteries yet. This is the story of Cindy James.
My name's Ben, I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicketing Rim, a true crime podcast.
The following I have material intended audience.
Listen.
You know, I really feel like we have just nailed our instros at this point, like like we have the same cadence and voice and everything. Like my name's Ben. Then you do your thing, go for it. You are way too tired this morning.
I like, what the fuck doing I don't care. You just did it like I did. You start over. My name's ben' nicle and you're listening to Wicked and Graham.
True crime podcast. It was different because we're like smiling and laughing on that one.
But you know what I mean, right, Yeah, yeah, for sure.
I honestly think you have like nailed it even more than me. You're like exactly the same every time.
Yeah, I think it's good. There was a problem though, because I would like a few months ago, where I would start it with or something like oh yeah, I'm Nicole or something, and then you were like, you got to stop this annoying.
I actually I haven't noticed you might still be doing it.
Oh shit. I maybe I I shouldn't have pointed it.
Out because I forgot all about it, but I noticed it a couple of times. Yeah, you were like, I'm Nicole.
It's funny because I watched this these Instagram stories of this this person like doing outfit try on Sure's at a clothing store, and everyone that she starts with she's does that. Oh no, And so if you're like going through really quick, it's like like time and I'm like, I don't. I guess no one's ever pointed that out to her. Maybe hey, drive me nuts nuts.
For show, But anyways, yeah, I just wanted to point that out. I thought that was kind of cool. I also wanted to point out that we have some pretty cool people over on Patreon supporting our show, including Chandra Vincent, Julie Triplett, Jennifer Hoague. I might have said your last name wrong, sorry if I did, Stephanie Cody, Marie Sar, Ultimate Badass Vanilla Killa, and Layla Shindl Decker. So thank you very much for supporting us over there.
It's quite a list right right on.
I wonder if Ultimate Badass Vanilla Killa is your your given name legal name?
Yeah?
Is it on your driver's license? Like, I'm curious, you know, it.
Could be, you know, but that just made me think of like names that are on driver's license, and I thought of mclovin.
Oh yeah, gotta love mclovin. But yeah, shout out to you guys. Thank you for signing up over on Patreon. If you guys want to sign up too, you can go ahead and check out the link and the description of this podcast. You get exclusive content behind the scenes. It's been a little bit quiet recently because we've been doing a bit of behind the scenes rehaul. We've been signing. We signed a new contract heading over to a new platform. We joined the Belief Believe.
Network hosting platform hosting platform.
Yeah. Yeah, so yeah, it's been a little bit of chaos behind the scenes, a little bit quiet, but everything is lining up. We're happy where we are. It's great people that we're working with. As far as you guys are concerned, there should be pretty much no changes with the show. It's just basically administrative stuff, to put it that way, but we're super super happy. And yeah, I just wanted to throw that out there.
Yeah, well, there was a little bit of a time where there weren't ads or whatever on the podcast, so that would be probably the only thing you would have noticed, really pretty much anbition.
Yeah, and I think the little chime or something like that might be different when the ads play or whatever, but that's that's basically it. That's all you'll notice. But yeah, I think we should get into this case though.
Yeah, I agree, let's do it, okay.
So this is part one of the story of Cindy James, So there will be a part two to this one. This one it's a little in depth, there's a lot to it, So buckley seat belts. It's going to be a wild ride and and you're not going to get the conclusion until next well this next episode, which will be in a few days.
We haven't done a two parter for.
A while, we haven't done it part, so we are due for one. So either buckle your seatbelts get ready for it. Or hey, maybe you're gonna wait for the next episode to come out and you'll binge the two together. Whatever the case, get ready for it, because this is one hell of a story. So Cindy Elizabeth Hack was born on June twelfth, nineteen forty four, in Oliver, Oliver, British Columbia. She was born to her parents, Matilda and
Auto Hack. She was one of six kids, and growing up back then was a whole it was a whole different world. Matilda and Auto were, you're pretty old school. They believe kids should be quiet, behave, and not make a whole lot of fuss. Auto in particular, was tough as nails. He if he was in a bad mood, it was usually kind of the kids who ended up receiving the bad end of it. And his way of handling discipline, well, let's just say it was not exactly gentle.
In his mind, if something was wrong, he could just mack it out. Of you sort of things. Oh yeah, now, I don't think it was like abusive sort of thing. It's just like, you know, back in that time, like spanking your kids sort of thing, or give you a smack of size her.
Head kind of more acceptable. I guess you could say.
It was more accepted at the time. Not to say it's right or not abuse, but just kind of giving you a frame of reference. Now. From a young age, Cindy figured out the safest bet was to stay on Auto's good side, though that was a lot easier said than done. She threw herself into her school work and chores, always hoping if she did well enough, Auto might actually
be proud of her. Whenever she got even a sliver of attention from him, she'd light up and go on about her latest accomplishments, her grades, or how much her teachers liked her, or how hard she was working in school, But compliments or praise from anyone besides Cindy herself were few and far between. After school, Cindy made up her mind she was going to become a nurse. Helping people had always come naturally to her, and she figured nursing
was the perfect way to do that. School was kind of her safe place, so she felt right at home in her nursing program. Every time she checked in with her family, she made sure to mention how well things were going. Now. At some point, her whole family ended up moving to France, leaving Cindy on her own for the first time in her life. She kept in touch, and so did they. They were writing letters whenever they could write, and of course visiting for the holidays as well.
But even with these letters and the occasional visits, Cindy often talked about how lonely she felt during that time, at least until she met a guy who would become her very first fiance. Oh yeah, getting a little romantic up in this house. So she met this guy while working at the hospital. Allegedly he was a doctor working at the hospital as well. So she's doing her training shifts and stuff, you know, and they kind of cross paths,
and that's kind of how it ignited. Now, they spent a lot of time working together, and before long he asked her out. Things moved fast after that, and they fell hard for each other and soon they were basically inseparable. Couldn't stop gushing about him, you know, especially in these letters. As she's writing home, she told her parents how he made her feel special, how he treated her like a queen, and how he'd be in the perfect husband and of
course would be the perfect father someday. Sorry I should say perfect husband eventually because he's not.
Oh okay, okay, I was like, I miss the wedding.
No, my apologies. I worded that weird, how he's going to be the perfect husband and father someday. Now. Her family naturally wanted to know more about this guy, simple things like you know what's his name, you know what's he like, and all this sort of stuff, But Cindy always seemed to dodge those questions. Instead, she'd steer the conversation back to you know, how perfect he was, and how he'd treated her, and how he'd already popped the question.
Okay, so it is okay. For some reason, I'm thinking, is this made up or something? Uh? Bear with me, okay, because but at first I was thinking, okay, that's how she sort of always talked to her family, like wants to make them think she's like so good and looking for praise and stuff but not really getting it. But all of a sudden, there I'm just like, Okay, what's going on here?
There are a lot of questions around this individual. Let's put it that way. Well, we're going through it right now. Okay, So this was huge news, this whole like pop the question being engaged sort of thing, obviously. And while some of Cindy's relatives were you know, over the moon for her, Matilda and Auto couldn't help but feel like something was off. Why hadn't this guy, whoever he was, tried to reach
out to them, even just to introduce himself. You know, maybe he should say hello to his future in laws or maybe you know, ask for their blessing, because we are talking about you know, a little bit older school type people here, right, And why was Cindy being so weirdly vague whenever asked these basic questions. It was strange, But with them living so far away, they didn't really want to push too hard or ask too much themselves. So still they made it clear that they'd really loved
to meet him, ideally in person, of course. Then eventually, you know, they invited him to come along for the holidays with Cindy so they could all, you know, get to know each other. But every time they brought this up, Cindy again had some sort of diversion from the conversation, or even some excuse. She said, in this case that he was too swamped at work where he was tied up with his own family, he wouldn't be able to make the holidays. Even though her family never got to
meet him. Cindy assured them that, you know, once they were married, they'd figure out a way to split holidays between both sides. She promised that it no matter how busy life got, they would make it work eventually.
Well, they are busy people, right, so I mean it makes sense that I'm it's journey right over there, so for sure.
Now. Unfortunately, that promise never had a chance to come true. As the holidays crept closer, Cindy and her fiance were unfortunately hit with devastating news. What was supposed to be just a standard check up at the doctor's office turned into a nightmare. See, her fiance was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of cancer. The doctor told him he only had a few months left at best.
Oh shit.
Cindy was heartbroken, but she refused to give up. She told him that, you know, in her mind, they're already married and in every way. This is like, this is how it matters. Right. We're together, we're basically married. She's going to be there for him through better and through worse, just like a married couple should be.
Yeah.
So she was determined to stick by a side no matter how rough the road ahead was going to be, But her fiance didn't see it the same way as she did. After the diagnosis, the two of them decided to go ahead with a ski trip that they had already booked. It was supposed to be a fun little getaway before the wedding, you know, a chance to relax, just be together. Now it felt more like a final escape. Yeah. This trip, however, changed from what it was what it
was supposed to be. Instead, it ended in tragedy. Cindy's fiance took his own life, leaving a note that said he couldn't stand the thought of her watching him waste away. He wanted her to remember him as the man she fell in love with, full of life, strong and completely in love with her.
Oh wow, Okay, that's like so sad, right.
But here's where things get strange. No one could ever find a single shred of evidence that this fiance ever existed. No records, no obituaries, oh nothing. There were no reports of a man taking his life at that ski trip.
Oh shit.
In fact, there wasn't any concrete evidence Cindy was ever engaged at all. The only trace of him was in the letters to her family, and even in those the details were all over the place, never quite adding up and very vague.
Okay, So this man might have been made up and then she decided that she had enough of this made up story, and then he had got cancer and then took his own life.
For It's hard to say, but as far as evidence goes, it seems that he was never real and he could have very well been made up.
And he was a doctor, right, like she met him through the hospital or something.
Met him through the hospital, and as far as I can find, he was supposedly a doctor.
Yes, okay, So you just I don't know, you think that would there would be evidence of this or or something you know, of his story out there.
Yeah, coworkers maybe being able to you know, confirm that. Yeah, Hey, you know, I know the dude his name was Stephen. Stephen was the man she was dating and he died and like totally get it, Like there should be some links somewhere pointing to the existence of this individual. Yeah, but as far as anyone can see, there's nothing.
Well, and because what time frame was this in? Sorry, what do you mean?
What time? Like?
How old of a case is this? I forget the year?
This is happening in the eighties, I believe.
Oh okay, yeah, I mean still there because we kind of think how everything is readily available to us now, but then back then it isn't as much, right, So I feel like something like that could potentially slip through.
Yeah, yeah, I mean it is.
There's a possibility.
It is possible, but it's not the most probable, let's put it that way.
Yeah.
Now, whether that mystery fiance ever actually existed or not, we don't know. But Cindy eventually moved on with her life one way or another, and eventually she crossed paths with a man named Roy make Peace, a psychiatrist originally from South Africa. Now Roy did in fact exist. Roy was thirty nine when he met Cindy, which put them nearly two decades apart in age. So she was about twenty ish and he was like thirty nine ish, right, But the gap, it didn't really sit well with her family.
Right off the bat, they felt like Roy was taking advantage of how trusting and inexperienced Cindy was in life. To them, it seemed like he was drawn in by her youth and good looks, and they worried that she was just a little bit too naive to see it. But as time passed on, they spent more and more time around Roy and Cindy together and their opinions softened on him a little bit. The two seemed to actually balance each other out, at least on the surface, and
some of those initial worries they started to fade. That's why it was such a shock when after sixteen years of marriage, Cindy dropped a bombshell. She told her family she was leaving Roy, and not just because they'd grown apart, but because that she had been abused pretty much from
the start of the relationship. Boy. Yeah, So to clarify, going back a little bit, the story takes place in the eighties, yes, but you have to look at like the sixteen years, so it was like probably early seventies, maybe late sixties when she supposedly.
Met that Oh okay, right, doctor dudeen.
Ski trip thing right now? According to Cindy, it began with small things in the relationship with Roy, emotional games. For example, if she didn't go along with something Roy wanted, he'd give her the cold shoulder for days. One big point of content was Roy's love of sailing. Cindy, on the other hand, was absolutely terrified of water, convinced she'd drowned if she ever ended up overboard, but Roy didn't
really care. He wanted her to come with him anyways, and when she said no, he'd freeze her out completely, treating her like she didn't exist, just ignoring her outright.
Holy shit, when she has an like, an actual fear, that's not cool.
Yeah. Now, as the years went on in this relationship, Cindy said, the emotional manipulation turned into more physical. She told her family that Roy would lash out and hit her when he did whenever she did something wrong or something that he didn't approve of. There was even one story where she claimed he'd thrown her down the stair, leaving her with black eyes and she had to hide
it under her makeup. What made it all harder to believe, at least for the people around her, was that no one had ever seen any clear evidence of that abuse. Her coworkers, her friends, even her own family had never noticed bruises or any obvious signs that something was wrong. Now, but of course that didn't mean that it didn't happen. No one really knows what goes on behind closed doors. People hide that stuff all the time, so that's definitely
not an indication that it's not happening right now. En Roy was asked about all of this, he did admit that, yeah, there were two separate times in their entire marriage over the course of sixteen years, where he did slap Cindy during arguments and incidents. He said, yeah, he crossed the line these two times and probably of course regretted it even but he did completely deny any kind of violent outside of that, or any sort of controlling or any sort of abuse outside of that.
Okay, so he's admitting to his wrongs. I guess you can.
Say he did admit that twice he struck her, but there was no other things like throwing her down the stairs, for example. Yeah, so not to say that, you know, striking her two times.
Is is is? Okay? Yeah?
Yeah, so outside of those incidents, he's saying there was no violent or physical abuse.
That it hadn't escalated to the point where he's throwing her down the stairs.
Correct now. Even though her family was caught off guard by Cindy's decision to leave roy they were one hundred percent behind her to do so, and they weren't too worried about her figuring out her life on her own either. By then, Cindy had built a solid career as a nurse, and everyone knew her as very smart, very capable, and dedicated to her job. She had a great reputation, and her friends and family made it very crystal clear that if she ever needed anything, they would be there in
a heartbeat for her. After for about four months of the breakup, so Cindy and Royer now split up. In September of nineteen eighty two, Cindy sat down with her family and dropped some unsettling news. She was convinced someone was stalking her. See over the last few weeks, she said she'd spotted a man, always dressed head to toe in black, sneaking around her property. When her family asked if she could describe this man who was sneaking around
her property, Cindy was pretty vague. She was sure that it was a man. But that was about all she could say then, not even just two weeks later, things escalated from there. The man clad in black wasn't just lurking outside anymore. The phone calls started. Cindy said. The calls were terrifying, graphic and violent and downright disturbing. The caller didn't just threaten her, he described in vivid, horrifying details,
exactly what he wanted to do to her. Oh, she said that she can even hear him getting off while on the phone.
That's some nasty shit, yeah.
Which left her feeling completely violated and unsure what to do next. At first, she thought maybe it was some sick teenager pulling a twisted prank, right, something completely tasteless, just trying to freak her out for the laughs. But as the calls kept going, she got, you know, the clearer idea that this was not just some dumb kid. The threats got weirder and more personal, like this person was actually watching her, knew her routines, her schedules, maybe even what she was wearing.
Okay, I was just going to say new things about her.
So yeah, things just spiraled, let's put it that way. On October twelfth, nineteen eighty two, about a month after she first spotted this prowler, Cindy picked up the phone and heard that same chilling voice on the other end. In a low, almost whispered tone, the caller told her I'm going to get you one night soon, and she didn't stick around to hear how that sentence ended.
Oh okay, I was like I was on the edge. Might see end end.
She immediately slammed the phone down, heart racing. After weeks of this, Cindy finally decided enough was enough. She called the Royal Canadian Mounted Police the RCMP, to report everything the prowler, you know, the disgusting phone calls, the constant feeling that someone was watching her. She needed to tell them. The officers took her very seriously.
Okay, that's good.
They could tell how shaken she was and you know, said that they were definitely concerned. So they suggested that she start keeping track of every single call that she got, you know, even the ones that seemed normal, right down the times. What they said, if the number showed up, anything that she could remember anything at all. You know, maybe the caller is describing what she's wearing, you know, writ down that the caller knew these things, whatever it was,
any detail. The hope was that maybe with enough records they could find some kind of pattern or clue or someone behind this right now. Cindy also asked if there's any way that they could send an officer to stay with her for a while, just in case this guy called or showed up again right now. Unfortunately, the police told her that that wasn't an option. There was no evidence right now. There was just her word that there's
something going on. So there's no proof, no recordings, no witnesses, nothing, and they couldn't justify assigning someone to her house. It's just not how it works right now. They weren't dismissing her, but their hands were kind of tied now. The lack of any real action from the RCMP left Cindy feeling pretty isolated and completely alone and honestly kind of embarrassed at the same time, like maybe she was overreacting, for example. But that feeling didn't last long. See, not long after
the officers left her home, her phone rang again. The second it started ringing, her stomach dropped immediately. If this creep had been watching her like she suspected, then they probably saw the police leave and they knew she was alone. Her hand shook as she picked up the phone, and on the other end was a voice that said, I'll get you.
That's it, just I'll get you. Okay. Here I thought they were going to say something about the police.
But well, the next day the same voice called back, the same voice that had been calling, and this time it was even worse, and they said, so you think calling the police will keep you safe? You wait, I've got my zipper open. Ugh, I'm talking to my throbbing dot dot.
Oh gosh, this is so unsettling. What a nasty, nasty man.
Yeah. Now, Cindy again didn't wait for the finish of that sentence as she dropped the phone down on its receiver, and that was that, yes, on the receiver. We are not talking about cell phones.
I know. I'm almost surprised that she picks up the phone. I feel like, well, I mean, I don't ever pick up my phone, like it rang this morning and You're like, you have a call, and I'm like, cool.
Well, honestly, it wasn't even ringing. It's on dudelster.
Yeah, it's always usually just I don't know what like silent. Well, no, not the calls so oh, the calls are always usually to someone like trying.
To oh, telemarketers or scammers and.
Yeah, you know the yeah, but she's keeping answering her phone. But I mean, I guess she does have to document this and stuff for the police exactly.
So she was shaking and she grabbed a notepad, and that's exactly what she did. She documented this phone call, diding exactly what the police told her. She wrote down everything, the time, exact words, which is how we can quote it, even how the voice sounded. She was determined to give them something they could actually work with, you know, next time that she called for help. Right, But whoever this was,
they weren't done. They were just getting warmed up. Two days after her first call to the RCMPI S Sindy phoned them again. This time someone had been right outside her house. She swore she heard footsteps on her and when she went out to go check, she found her porch lights were smashed. Oh geez, Now, the porch lights being smashed, to me, that means, you know, if she's
entering or exiting her house at night, it's dark, it's dark. Yeah, you know, maybe concealing an attack, So that's ominous in itself. The police came back and they did a thorough check of the area. They checked her house, her yard, even up and down the street in the neighborhood. They didn't find a thing, no footprints, no broken glass leading anywhere, no shadowy figure hiding nearby. It was like, whoever did this just disappeared into thin air. Then the very next
day things escalated again. Cindy called the police in a full panic, saying someone had just thrown a rock straight through her window, and not just that, she was convinced someone had actually been inside her house. When officers showed up, they found Cindy practically shaking out of her skin in hysteria. It was clear she was terrified, and honestly, they couldn't blame her. Ever was messing with her was getting bolder by the day, and it was obvious Cindy felt like
she was running at a time. Once again, the officer searched everywhere, the house, the yard, the street, neighborhood, and once again there was nothing, no sign of anyone hanging around nothing. Whoever was stalking Cindy was either a ghost or they were blending in so well with the neighborhood that they might have just been hiding and right in plain sight. Now I'm not accusing anyone by saying this,
but for example, it was the neighbor. It was, you know, one of the officers, something like that, someone who can hide in plain sight. And like when a phone call comes in or an officer comes in, it's like the neighbor's caught in the yard and it's like, oh no, I'm just like grabbing a piece of garbage off the lawn. Okay,
something like that for example, you know what I mean. Now, that same week, just when Cindy thought things couldn't get any worse, she went to climb into bed at the end of the day, she pulled back the covers and froze. See when she pulled back those covers in her blankets, she found her pillow sliced wide open with a knife. The realization hit her like a punch in the gut. Whoever was tormenting her had just been watching. Hadn't just
been watching from a distance. They'd been inside the house confirmed now, and maybe even while she was inside the house too.
Oh my, oh, okay, that's too much. That is so alarming. I don't even know how you could could carry on, really, I know.
Cindy was shaking in fear, and of course called the police. They showed up took her statement, but with everything piled up, one of the officers, Constable Patrick McBride with the RCMP, he decided he was going to take a bit more action. He started digging into her case a bit more seriously. Now, Patrick couldn't ignore the timing. Cindy had just ended a nearly twenty year marriage right sixteen years, and now she
was living alone for the first time in ages. That kind of life change can leave someone very vulnerable and in Patrick's mind, and it seemed pretty likely that her ex husband might have something to do with all of this. Okay, now, Cindy shut that theory down real fast. She told Constable Patrick that she didn't believe Roy would ever do something like this. According to her, Roy was way too busy
with work to be sneaking around her house. And she also said that she and Roy were actually on pretty decent terms and that he would never hurt her.
Okay, but also, I'm just gonna play devil's advocate. As you say, being in a relationship takes a lot, like a long a lot of your time, and so all of a sudden, if you're not in a relationship, I feel like you would have so much spare time that he may have time to do this.
That's true, That's very true. Now, one thing is clear, though, what she told officers, being you know, they're in good terms and that he would never hurt her, it didn't line up with her story she told friends and family about her abuse during the marriage. Right Still, though, Cindy insisted Roy was not a threat. In fact, she even said that she called Roy before she contacted the police about these events, and he'd actually been the one to tell her that she needed to report everything to the
authorities and get some protection. So that doesn't exactly screamed guilt. If Roy was the one behind all this, why would he encourage her to get the comps involved?
Right? Well, I mean not necessarily. I feel like people sometimes it's like covering your own book, right.
True, But at one point, like he wants her to be alone and vulnerable, right, getting the police involved is going to make that harder. So most likely, not for sure, I totally agree with you, but Devil's advocate. Most likely he wouldn't want that to be the case, you know, m hm. So, hoping to get some outside perspective, Constable Patrick decided to check with the people living next door to Cindy. Maybe someone had seen something. Turned out, one
of the neighbors they had. They told Patrick they'd noticed a man hanging around outside these places more than once, sometimes during the day, sometimes late at night. The neighbor even saw him walking right through Cindy's front gate once. Now, at the time, they figured this was just some new boyfriend or something. After all, she's nearly single, right, so
they didn't think much of it. When the neighbor was shown a photo of Roy, they didn't hesitate to say that they were one hundred percent sure that that man that they seen was not Roy.
Okay, okay, I thought you were going to go the other way with that one, but that's.
Why I lingered on the side. So drug it on a bit to build that suspense and it worked, clearly did. But yeah, they confirmed that the man in that they had seen lurking around was not Roy, not the same guy in the photo that they the RCMP showed. Now, one more piece of the puzzle came from inside Cindy's house itself. She had been renting out her basement to a couple of tenants to help cover her bills. So
Patrick talked to them too. Both of them said they'd occasionally heard noises upstairs when Cindy should have been at work, footsteps, doors opening, that kind of thing. Now, at the time, they figured maybe Cindy would have just you know, come home early from work whatever.
Right, Well, yeah, people always just make excuses up for things, right, because I mean that's human nature.
So well exactly, And it's not like these people know Cindy's schedule, or probably don't know Cindy's schedule exactly.
Maybe she's sick and home or something.
Right, or swap shifts with someone else, you know. I'm sure nurses probably do that because they got quite a radic schedules off, right, So I would imagine that there is some shifts swapping with them. I don't think that would be uncommon. But now with everything happening, they were starting to wonder if that person or footsteps or doors closing that they were hearing was actually, you know, the person who was tormenting Cindy. Now, Constable Patrick wasn't just
interested in Cindy's case. See, it quickly became personal for him. Something about her situation really struck him, and after just a couple of days in the case, he took it upon himself to show up at her house with a toolbox in hand, and he installed the dead bolts on all of her trying to give her at least some peace of mind.
Oh my goodness, that like warms my heart.
Yeah. He also promised he'd stop by every day to check in, just to make sure she was okay. Now, this kind of personal involvement is not exactly standard police procedure, but Patrick was already feeling a pull towards Sindry, that Cindy that went beyond just doing his job. Oh yeah, so he was starting to, you know, get some feelings for her, right, okay, Yeah, So that attachment, that feeling,
of course, eventually spilled into his personal life. His marriage, for example, would come to an end, and soon after that he and Cindy officially started dating.
Oh shit, Okay, so this guy was even married.
He was married, correct?
Huh.
I'm unsure if he left his wife for Cindy, or if the attention he was giving Cindy within the case or other things caused trouble in the marriage for an amicable split up, but one way or another, the marriage ended and he ended up dating Cindy.
Dang. Okay, that is a plot twist that I did not see coming.
There's a lot of plot twists in this story, trust me on that.
Wow.
Now, from that point on, Patrick spent most of his free time over at Cindy's place. What made all of this weird though, was that, almost like clockwork, the second Patrick started hanging around, all the creepy calls, threats and weird incidents, they just stopped. It was like whoever was stalking Cindy didn't want a risk getting caught with Patrick around.
Well that doesn't make sense though it does.
But then right before Halloween, Cindy found something chilling left on her front porch. There was a ransom style note made by cutting out letters from the newspaper and it simply read quote soon.
Cindy, dot dot dot.
I don't think it's had doc over. I know, I'm not sad, cut out and pasted three dots, but now shake and Cindy called Patrick immediately and asked him to move in with her, hoping to have you know him there full time and scaring off whoever was doing this. Patrick didn't hesitate. He agreed right away. Now. Interestingly enough, though, Cindy gave a slightly different version of events to her friends. You see, it's a little bit questionable in this situation
on who asked who to move in. See, according to her, Patrick had actually offered to move in on his own, saying that he wanted to monitor the house during his off hours. She insisted that even though they were dating him, staying there was purely for safety and nothing romantic about it. Okay, Interesting, So Patrick's saying that Cindy asked him to move in, and she's saying that Patrick asked to move in. Yeah yeah, Now,
not long after Patrick moved in, something strange happened. One evening, he spotted Roy make Peace sitting alone in his car parked right near Cindy's house. Oh dang, yeah, Roy is Cindy's ex husband. Right when Patrick approached him to ask what the hell he was doing there, Roy casually told him that he was just keeping an eye in the neighborhood, trying to catch the stalker himself. Apparently, he'd even brought along two guns, a rifle and a handgun with him
sitting next to him in the car. Now, Patrick couldn't exactly arrest him for you know, sitting in his car in a street or something like that. Right, there's no evidence that Roy was doing anything wrong, so he just simply told Roy to pack up and go home and leave. So Roy left without argument. Now, this weird situation aside, there was something almost predictable about this whole situation. As long as Patrick was physically in the house, the calls
and harassment completely stopped. Whoever was behind it seemed to know exactly when Patrick was around and only target Cindy when she was alone, and then not before long. That's when the threats started showing up in a new form, handwritten notes, disturbing images. They were all left on her porch, stuck to her windows, or tucked under the windshield wiper of her car. At one point, someone even cut the phone line to her house, but every time the police investigated,
they came up empty. No footprints, no fingerprints, no sign of anyone coming or going. It was like her tormentor was a ghost. After about a month of living together, Cindy decided Patrick's present wasn't actually helping as much as she'd hoped. If anything, the whole situation felt even more tense, and she was worried his constant presence was making things worse.
They talked it over and Patrick agreed to move out, but on one condition, only if you could keep a key to her house just in case of an emergency. Cindy agreed, and even after he moved out, they kept dating for about.
Okay, I was just gonna ask, was that like a breakup or what?
No?
I mean?
And Cindy did say to her friends that, you know, them living together was for a safety thing, not a romantic Yeah.
Right.
So now, what Cindy didn't know was that, starting in January of nineteen eighty three, the police began secretly wiring her phone. They tapped her phone line. They hope that if the caller kept up their campaign of terror, if you will, they could finally trace the call and figure out who was behind them.
Now.
Unfortunately, the calls were just a little too short for each each time for the tech to pin down the exact location. All they could figure out was that the calls were coming from somewhere on the outskirts of Vancouver. Six months after the nightmare began, things kept getting worse and took a terrifying new turn. On January twenty seventh, nineteen eighty three, Cindy's friend and coworker, Agnes Woodcock, swung
by her house. See the two of them had made plans to hang out after work that day, just a low key evening to relax, catch up sort of thing. But when Agnes knocked, there was no answer. So she tried knocking on the door again, and still no answer.
The house was silent. Figuring Cindy might be in the shower, or maybe had dozed off or forgotten that Agnes was showing up, whatever, she walked around to the back of the house to see if there was another way to get Cindy's attention inside, and that's when she stumbled onto a terrifying scene. Agnes was horrified by what she found. She made her way to Cindy's garage, and there on the cold floor was Cindy, crouched down, trembling with a
nylon stalking tightly wrapped around her neck. She was shaking to her core, and though tears and panic, she told Agnes exactly what had happened. According to Cindy, she heard a knock at the front door, and when she opened it, a man forced his way inside and drug her into the garage, where a second man was already waiting for her. Together, they held her down and strangled her, both of them putting their hands around her neck, squeezing until she thought
she'd pass out. She also told Agnes, though her memory was fuzzy, she believed that one of the men had sexually assaulted her with a knife.
What the shit? Yeah, Okay, that is a huge escalation.
Isn't it. So before they left, the men warned Cindy and then as she went to the police, they'd track her sister down, her sister Melanie, and kill her.
Oh.
To prove they weren't bluffing, they told Cindy details about Melanie's life, things only someone who'd been watching her closely would know.
Huh.
When Agnes asked if Cindy could describe the attackers, all she could say was that they were both wearing white sneakers, and that was the only detail that stuck in her mind. Now. Despite these threats, Agnes didn't hesitate. She called the police right away. When officers and paramedics arrived, they got Cindy to the hospital for a full examination. But this is where things got a little complic For someone who'd just been overpowered by two grown men, Her injuries didn't really
line up with her story. Her neck was read from a nylon stalking being tied around her neck, but there were no deep bruises or signs that anyone had used any serious force. We're talking her story was two men strangling.
Well yeah, and they were using their hands at points too, so you think there'd be like handprints or something.
Bruising or something, But most of her injuries were minor surface level scrapes and some small bruising, barely at all, nothing you'd expect from a violent assault from alleged two attackers. And furthermore, there was no physical evidence to suggest that she'd been sexually assaulted at all, let alone with a knife.
Well, yeah, with a knife, that is. Oh, I can't even imagine.
Yeah. The whole thing left investigators scratching their heads. If someone had gone through all this trouble to terrorize Cindy, why had they left her alive? And if there really were two men working together, who was the second person lot alone the first? Right? Nothing about this made any sense. The inconsistencies made police more suspicious than sympathetic. They wanted answers, and they started to wonder if Cindy wasn't telling them everything.
To get a better sense of what was going on, they asked her to see a psychiatrist, hoping a professional might be able to help shed some light or you know, help her at all. But Cindy flat out refused. She was terrified that if people found out she was seeing a psychiatrist, they'd labeled her as unstable, and that was the last thing she wanted. Now. Remember we are talking about mental health in the eighties. Yeah, Instead, she compromised and agreed to see a general practitioner who was also
experienced with counseling. It wasn't exactly what the police wanted, but it was better than nothing. Now. By this point, the investigation was at a complete stand still. The more Cindy told them, the less things made sense at all. It felt like there were so many large gaps in the story and what was going on, you know, things that she want wasn't saying, or maybe couldn't bring herself to say.
Hoping to get some clarity, they asked her to take a polygraph test when the results came back, it confirmed what they started to suspect. Cindy wasn't being completely honest with authorities. There were things that she knew that she just wasn't sharing with them.
Okay, like maybe she knew these people or something. I don't know.
Well, that's where we're gonna end part one.
Oh my gosh, Okay, what you look pissed? Well kind of because this case is kind of like, I don't know how to describe it, but it's just fucking all over the place.
Really, it really is. Honestly, you nailed it. It's fucking all over the place.
Yeah, And it's just I don't know. It seems like it plays with your mind a bit, like I don't know.
Well, there's a lot of things where it's like, oh, I believe Cindy, and then there's a lot of things where it's like, oh, I don't believe Cindy. So you're very at least I am very contrary adding myself and my beliefs and my thoughts and what I want to say is true and false because.
I'm I'm left sitting here just being what the fuck kind of thing, like what the fuck's happened here? And now I have to fucking wait and tell Friday to find out.
I will promise you that what the fuck feeling will stay even to the end. Oh gosh, okay, I promise you. Huh wow.
I mean yeah, it's just sitting here listening to this It's the world is scary because I don't know. It also just makes you uneasy too, because I don't know, people are kind of fucked up.
I like, how you just you're so angry with this case that you get halfway through a sentence and you're like, I don't know, well.
I know. I even lately have been watching these shows on Netflix too that I think I need to watch something that's just I don't know, gives you a sense that human nature or humans are not terrible people. Yeah, basically, because right now I'm just like, oh my god, these two bastards are doing this to her, and I'm just, yeah, I'm kind of on Cindy side.
Actually, I feel like maybe we should watch some Disney movies. How's that?
M hmm.
Get a little bit more cheer going on. Yeah, Well, thank you guys for being here. Hopefully that you enjoyed this, and we'll talk to you in Part two. Where Yeah, we go through the rest of this and wrap up the case. And trust me when I say, there is a lot to this and that's what the fuck feeling will be there through it all. But I still hope you're enjoying this.
Nichole's not no I am. I'm just like I have to go through my day now like this, wondering what the hell I'm going to be testing Ben, I'll find out the deeps. I'll post them on Instagram, just kidding, just kidding.
You will not find out the deats, but I can tell you, guys, you can find out the deats on many more things about our show and the description of this podcast, including social media, website, you name it. It's all down there. You can sign up for Patreon there. Go ahead check it out, click on the links, give us a review. We appreciate it all. We're an indie podcast doing our thing. We can't be doing it without your support, so thank you so much.
Yeah, we appreciate you
And until next time, stay wicked.