_ The pain remains

Nearly a year later, the families of Kevin

_Vermette’s victims take it day by

By DERRICK PENNER

IT HAS been 332 days since the murder of Mark Teves, Michele Mauro and David Nunes ‘last July 12 but for the families it might as well have been yesterday,

And just as the wounds haven’t healed over time, the incident has left a divide in parts of the community surrounding why it happened.

There are those who believe Vermette was seriously provoked on one side, on the other — while they don't deny he might have been — people point to the victims as innocent in that. -.“Someone has even come up to me and said they were on Kevin's side, be had done a good thing — right to my face,’? said Donny Oliveira, the fourth victim and survivor of the

. attack,

_ And Oliveira can’t understand how people can think that way, even if Vermette was provoked. He added he hears other things, and hears of arguments that bave started over the issue.

Vermette followed the car the victims were travelling in to the dead-end Jane at Hirsch Creek Park at about 9:30 p.m. July 12, 1997,

The four young men were headed to a bachelor party in Terrace and stopped at the park to mect a friend.

Vermette got out of bis truck and shot all four. Witnesses heard eight shots before Vermette drove off. He left both of his vehicles at the motel where he lived and then vanished.

Oliveira and Nunes knew Vermette from working out at the Riverlodge weight room, and they didn’t get along. The two young men had a running dispute with Vermette over the rap music they played while there.

Once, Oliveira said, the dispute resulted in a physical altercation, but he doesn’t believe it should have sparked the murder.

*{ would like to know what my son did to him,”’ said Frank Mauro, the father of Michele. As far as Mauro knows Michele didn’t know Vermette at all, He was on a summer break from college in Calgary, so he wasn’t involved in the dispute Oliveira and Nunes had with Vermette.

‘’Mauro said he gets angry and bitter when he hears people say they believe Vermette was provoked. He added he realizes people often say ‘or do things that provoke anger. .

**But that was no reason to go and kill people and try to kill people. He murdered three in- nocent young people,” Mauro said.

Celeste Teves, Mark’s mother, said she also believes her son didn’t have anything to do with Vermette.

day

She and her daughter were on a family visit to Portugal when she learned of the murders, a trip Mark was supposed to join two weeks laler.

Teves added she never heard Mark mention Vermette’s name and Mark was the type of per- son to turn the other cheek.

*‘] really hope Vermette is caught because I

Ben rn ban is

don't understand why (Mark) is dead, why he ‘was Shot — and it looks like be was the first to -be killed,”’ she said.

DONNY OLIVEIRA, the lone survivor of Kevin Vermette's shooting spree July 12, . 1997, stands at a memorial to his three friends who were killed that night. Questions

That is why it is important Vermette be found and brought to justice, so she can know the whole story and clear her son’s name.

“{ think there are people in this town that think this way, what did they do to Vermette for him to kill them,’” Teves said, ‘‘This hurts me because my son didn't do nothing, and the other ones didn’t do nothing to be killed.”

‘She admitted to feeling a bit of anger and guilt too, ‘When things like this happen, always comes the guilt. Why I didn’t know this before? Why didn’t 1 know what was going on?

“But [ didn’t have a way to know it,” Teves said.

Mauro and Teves both believe it was one inci- deni in particular, the slashing of tires on Vermette’s truck, which pushed him over the edge.

Ironically, others came forward to take re- sponsibility for that act, and police know the

and pain remain. PHOTO COURTESY THE NORTHERN SENTINEL, KITIMAT.

Both Mauro and Teves believe Vermette is still alive because of the deliberateness of the act,

And Mauro believes someone must be helping him, “It’s impossible for somebody to dis- appear for a year unless someone helps.”

RCMP Cpl. Rick Marshinew, lead investigat- or on the case, said police still haven't pieced together a clear motive linking Vermette to the victims. The tires to one of Vermette's vehicles were slashed the night before the murders. The owner of the motel where Vermette lived said he was angered by ‘the act and even made a threat to kill whoever did it.

Marshinew wasn’t aware of police taking any formal complaints from Vermette on being harassed or provoked.

He added investigators have also loaked into tips that certain people have helped or har-

Smithers, Fort Babine, Prince George and Ter- Tace areas.

None proved to have any information that Vermette was ever with the individuals, and he doubts anyone has helped him.

‘*This was a spontancous decision he made on his own, and once he was done, he vanished,”’ added Marshincw,

‘tAnd still,’? says Teves, '‘I have to wake up every day to this terrible, terrible pain that never will be the same.””

Oliveira looks at life differently now, taking things day by day, ‘That day I didn’t think any- thing like that was going to happen to me.”

Now he knows that you never know,

Penner is a reporter at The Northern Sentinel in Kitimat. He’s been nominated for a national award for his coverage of the

shooting victims had nothing to do with it.

Armed and dangerous

boured Vermette.

Those came from the

Vermette case.

Murder reward now $17,500

POLICE HOPE a major reward will help shake loose the break that has so far eluded them in the scarch for tiple murder suspect

Kevin Vermette. Kitimat RCMP, ihe RCMP’s Prince Rupert

serious crimes unit, the local reward committee and fam- ily members of the victims held a press conference

‘today to announce a $17,500 reward for Vermctte’s capture.

And in doing so the RCMP have made the

Kitlmat murder suspect Canada’s most wanted criminal,

Vermette, now 43, has been at large since the inci- dent fast July 12 In which Vermette gunsied down four Kitimat men at Creek park, killing three of

them and seriously wound- |

ing the fourth.

_ David Nunes, Mark Teves and Michele Mauro were ‘killed. Donny Oliveira sur-

vived, Vermette has

Hirsch -

been

charged with three counts of second degree murder and one of attempted murder and there has been a Canada-wide warrant out for his arrest since the al- tack,

“At this particular time

‘we are no closer to making

au arrest of Kevin Vermette than we were at the begin- ning of the investigation,”’ said RCMP Cpl. Rick Mar- shinew, lead investigator on the case.

He added the public has overwhelmed police with its

response to publicity since - |;

the murders happened.

Police received more. than 500 tips from citizens around the northwest, coast to coast in Canada and into the U.S. because of the media attention focused on the case.

So far, Marshinew said, .

_ they've ruled out almost all “of them, except tips on two-

possible sightings in the Smithers area last October which RCMP weren’t able to confirm.

Kevin Vermette

Hunters from Kitimat

reported coming across a. man who fit Vermetie’s des-"

cription on foot on a gravel

road in the Hudson’s Bay

Mountaln area,

Marshinew said investi- gators believe it is still a strong possibility Vermette is alive and on the run. He is repuied to be a skilled out-

doorsman who knows the northwest well,

“T think any intelligent in- dividual committing a crime of this magnitude, once on the move, could be out there

for some time,’’ Marshinew

added. He said the Kitimat detachment and investi-

_ gators with the RCMP’s

Prince Rupert and Prince George serious crime units have invested a lot of time in the case,

“Tt can be frustrating, the trait will often go hot and cold,’’? Marshinew said.

That is where the public plays an important role, ac- ting as the eyes and ears of the police.

Marshinew said the file will never be closed, not un- lil Vermette is found or time passes well beyond his ex- pected life span.

“Given his age it would be numerous decades before this file is closed,’’ he added.

Marshinew said police’s prime concern is a smooth,

safe arrest. They consider him armed and dangerous

and anyone who sces him is

advised not to approach him.

He is described as a Caucasian male, Sft. 8in, tall, 177 ibs., with blue eyes and brown hair. He wears glasses and has some dis- tinctive tatloos — one of a cat on his upper right arm, with the word ‘LUCKY’ in- scribed below. The olhers are on his left upper arm and are a coyoie and the moon, and a dagger through a rose.

He is an excellent car- penter, has good mechanical knowledge and has worked as a truck driver. Vermette is known to prefer temporary employment,

He is a loner, police des- cribing him as antisocial, hot tempered and meticulous in cleanliness and organization,

Anyone with information

on his whereabouts is asked.

to call their nearest RCMP detachment or Crimestop- pers number.

Bem ae Tee

The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, June 17,1998 - AS age -angne-gtrerrrippeaeapey nearer apron rin ear past

CORRESPONDENCE FOR THE TERRACE STANDARD

The Mail Bag

Story cuts to the bone

Dear Sir:

Re: the June 3, 1998 article in The Terrace Standard where Larisa Tarwick was interviewed as Chairperson of the Terrace Arca Community Health Council.

Ms. Tarwick’s disingenuous comments not only necd corecting, they have unaminously been found frankly insulting by the Terrace-based surgeons. To correct but a few points, the whole emphasis of the hospital ad- ministration is not to increase endoscopy proccdurcs but as a blanket policy — in order lo save money — to cut as much operating time as deemed necessary, regardless of consequences.

To. say that ‘‘physicians need to buy in”’ to-endos- copy procedures is to iguore the fact that susgeons have been dragging the hospital into twentieth century tech- niques —~ such as endoscopic procedures — usually by going out to the community and getting the funding for the equipment themselves.

Currently the general surgeons are wishing to iutro- duce a new technique in hernia repairs, held up only by bureaucralic procrastination and the funding crisis.

We take issue wilh the quote ‘‘nothing we are doing will affect direct patient care.’”? Only two weeks ago a surgeon was requested to cancel an elective surgical procedure for one reason only; to save money.

This ignored the fact this patient had waited three months for this procedure, taken leave from a demand- ing job, driven from Prince Rupert to have it done and had been starving for 18 hours by the time the cancella- tion request was made,

Further, the hospital plans to close the operating rooms one day every four or five weeks; palently this will affect patient care.

Ultimately we see the problem as inadequate funding by the government for this hospital. It is an irrefutable

fact that Prince Rupert, with a smaller population and offering less services, has a bigger budget than Terrace, but we know their MLA, Dan Miller, is prepared to stick his neck out for his community.

Could the problem in Terrace be that our MLA and non-elected hospital board are not?

Dr. L. Aliaas, Dr. J. Dunfield

Dr. W. Evans, Dr. T, Nagy

Dr. F, Osei-Tutu, Dr. M. Vanlierde Dr. S. Watson, Terrace, B.C.

City not dodging airport Dear Sir:

Mr. Duffus’ letter concerning the operation of the Terrace/Kitimat airport (The Terrace Standard, May 29, 1998) has so many incorrect statements and im- plications that I thought someone should reply to it,

Mr. Duffus says that a committee has been formed to study the airport situation. I assume he is referring 1o the people recently been appointed to the board of directors of the Terrace/Kitimat Airport Society.

This group of very competent representatives of the business and general community was appointed alter advertising for interested citizens,

And their function is not to study the situation, as

i, Slated.by Mr. Duffus, but to manage the operation of

the airport.

In fact, very considerable study has already been done over the past three years since the federal govern- ment informed us they would be withdrawing from op- eration of our airport.

Contrary to Mr. Duffus’ statements, city council and staff and the city’s Tourism and Economic Develop ment Commission have been engaged in very detailed discussions with Transport Canada and the province of all aspects of operation of the airport.

We have been assisted in these discussions by the Union of B.C. Municipalities representing all ihe con-

munities that have taken over, or are in the process of

_ taking over, their airport operations.

Furthermore, Mr. Duffus has obviously not been ful- lowing what has been going on when he suggests we should bring in a consulting firm to advise us. We have already done exactly this and have had a major study done by a consultant who has had a great deal of expe- rience with airport operations,

This study has led to a business plan that gives us considerable confidence that the airport can be opera- ted ina financially viable way.

Finally, Mr. Duffus states or implies a number of times that the public has not been kept informed.

If he had been reading the newspapers and/or been listening ia the radio and T'V news he would know ex- actly what has been happening with this matter.

Also, several of the present city council members, in- cluding myself, made the airport operation an impor- tant issue during the last municipal clections — and we have fully followed through with our promises.

Val George, City Councillor, Terrace B.C.

Just buy a leash

Dear Sir:

Of course dogs should be able to run free on Ferry Is- land. You should be able to take your $500 poodle, complete with manicure, fluff cut, shampooing and mascara and Ict poodle have a nun.

The first campsite poodle visits will be guarded by a rotweiler crossed with a grizzly bear,

When poodle comes back — if poodle comes back — poodle will look like a bad rug with a blood clot.

Then what to do? Sue? Sue who? The cily? Ha!

Sue the lawyer that owns the rotwciler, the lawyer that gave the rotweiler his attitude?

Better you should spend five bucks ona leash,

Les Watmough, Terrace B.C.

The Terrace Standard welcomes letters to the editor. Our deadline is noon Friday for the following Wed- nesday’s issue. Our mailing address is 3210 Clinton St, Terrace, B.C. V8G S5R2. Our Jax number is 250- 638-8432. We particularly welcome letters via e-mail. Our e-mail address is standard@kermode.net

More letters, Page A6

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