On Feb. 2, 2001, at 10.30 p.m. Sheila received a call from Michelle. "Guess who just called me," she said. The answer was Kathy, who was in Vernon, B.C. and had only learned of the fifth estate program, "Scandal of the Century" but she had not seen it yet. She had been told about it by her long-time resource teacher who had caught the January 24 update and recognized Michael and Michelle as possibly being Kathy's siblings.

Kathy had no idea that fifth estate had been looking for her. She had been desperately trying to get more information for more than a week and had, on a long-shot gamble, decided to ask SaskTel information for a listing for Michelle. Lo and behold, Michelle was listed and she got through.

"We talked for over an hour!" Michelle jubilantly told Sheila. Along with her delight, Michelle expressed anger at having just learned that Kathy had actually travelled by bus to Saskatoon at Christmas time, just six weeks earlier, with the intention of tracking down her family. She had called Diane Ens who told her that Michelle was no longer in the city and that she was a prostitute who had "run off with her boyfriend"and that Michael was in jail and she thought he had AIDS. Neither of these pieces of malicious information were true. (More)

Over the next couple days Sheila and Kathy communicated by e-mail and telephone and Feb. 4, Sheila drove to Calgary to get Kathy who took the bus there from Vernon. They spent the night in Calgary and Sheila showed her the tape of "Scandal of the Century."

The picture above shows Kathy speaking on the phone to Michelle and Michael. The three were scheduled to have their reuinion televised the next day but as it turned out, Sheila took her to get together with her siblings shortly after she got off the phone.

They stayed up all night sharing memories and the next day Kathy was interviewed by Jo Lynne Sheane.

Kathy sayed in Saskatoon for a few weeks during which time she and Michelle filed a lawsuit against Social Services just before their 19th birthday. She was also in Saskatoon for the birth of Michelle's son, Manyel.

She went back to Vernon and attempted to finish her grade twelve and almost completed it, a tremendous accomplishment under the circumstances. She also made contact with Dale and Anita.

In July, Kathy took the bus to Altona, Manitoba to visit Rick and Kari Klassen. While she was there, she revealed a great deal more about what had been going on during the years we still knew so little about. She also wrote a letter to Chris Axworthy, to which he has not yet replied.

Kathy came back to Saskatoon in the fall, hoping to resolve past conflicts and construct family bonds with her parents. This did not work out as she had hoped and she returned to B.C. Michael went with her, hoping to see some of the world outside Saskatchewan. He saw the mountains but he didn't stay.

Michelle and Michael are trying to put together bus fare to bring Kathy to Saskatoon again, hoping they can build a family built on their own generation. The three Rosses have learned a lot about themselves and each other and have taken some important steps into adulthood. This has been possible because of some harsh lessons they have all learned about who they can trust.

Kathy's therapy assignments: "Dear Carol" | report on the day Michael raped her in Carol Bunko's office

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If it wasn't for the notebook on the table you could almost think this wasn't just another working meeting for Marilyn Thompson (between Kathy and Michelle) and Diane Ens, Social Service's employee in charge of their file.

Revitalizing the archives From 1998 until 2002, injusticebusters was in the throes of identity crisis. What was it? What were we doing? We grappled with editorial policy at the same time we were learning the nuts and bolts of building and posting a website. Once we had a secure, paid site I had full editorial control, although I talked regularly to Richard Klassen who was forced to move his family several times and did not always have access to the internet. Rick's pages: one | two We posted our earliest and later actions. Early versions of the site can be found on the Wayback Machine. I began following other threads to stories of police and prosecutorial misconduct and the site's character took on another facet: a newsclipping scrapbook where stories could live longer than they would in print form. I also began picking up other stories of wrongfully convicted people. It was an explosion. By 2003 there were over 700 pages. I also had contact with several other people (Don Smith, Leon Walchuk, Monique Turenne, the Vopnis) and kept these stories going. It was the story of the Ross children's treatment at the hands of the Saskatchewan government which grabbed the attention of The Fifth Estate. The civil claim (The $10M Lawsuit as we called it) was only mentioned briefly at the end of their show which aired in November, 2000. When Richard Klassen began to make progress in bringing his civil claim to court, the government and police defendants alleged he was breaking the rules of court by publishing discovery material on the internet. MacNeil clinic (the document which started it all) The Thompson Papers Carol Bunko-Ruys reports This claim was absolutely false. However, rather than risk being thrown out of his civil claim, Klassen undertook before Judge Mona Dovall to sever all ties with the website. The court fights: Les Perreaux report QB271 These pages have links which lead to other pages from that era. Now that some of the dust has settled, I have been going back through the material we had posted in the early days. In the spirit of keeping the scrapbook alive, I have been reformatting and placing links. The original material remains intact. I hope the information, which chronicles our struggle is useful to you. The identity crisis is over. We know who we are --Sheila Steele, March 28, 2005

Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd. William Blake, The Proverbs of Hell

Truth suppress'd, whether by courts or crooks, will find an avenue to be told. Sheila Steele, injusticebusters.com

If you hold the mouth of Truth, It will burst out its rib-cage. Somali proverb

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Publisher : Sheila Steele

Got something to say about this or any other stories on this site? Go to injusticebustersblog Participate!

injusticebusters court advice :

How to walk yourself through the justice system

 

Why you should dump your preliminary hearing (written July 1998 and still valid)

 

Sermonette: The Naked Truth -- (You will find links to many more sermonettes in the sidebar on this page

Another target of Dueck's malice: : Wilf Hathway

Our activism contributed greatly to the good vibes which happened around the civil trial.

Index to the stories on this website

This is not regularly updated so if you are looking for a particular story and you have a name or keyword, please use the site search engine(at the bottom of the page) which IS regularly updated

Index to Saskatoon Police stories

This is a pretty good scrapbook for the 1998-2002 period.

Inquiry into the malicious prosecution of David Milgaard untanling 36 years of Saskatchewan police and Crown misconduct: : Opening day 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |

Stephen Williams: Canadian writer subject to Stasi-like treatment by Canadian police

Terry Arnold: : Snitch a suicide?

RCMP scenario stings: Brian Hutchinson starts digging

Gary wells: Faulty eye-witness testimony

Tulia, Texas

Gilmer, Texas

Willie Upshaw

Wrongfully convicted in Canada

Foster Parent false accusations

Martensville

Don Smith obscenity trial: an obscene conviction

James Lockyer

Hurricane Carter

Johnny Cochran speaks up for Bill Sampson

Vopnis

Abdulai Mohamed

Nfld Defamation story:

Wanda Young

Racism in the Federal Civil Service

The Terrible Story behind the Atif Rafay and Sebastian Burns convictions

Trial set for June 15

We know part of this disclosure is a forged statement and perjured affidavit from a Winnipeg cop

The Crown is still fighting Fred Poirier -- and they are losing. Secret Commissions Case from Northern B.C.

 

 

2005: In the United States the proven wrongful convictions just keep coming at us!

 

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Brandon Morin:

Convicted in Oregon

of rapes which did not happen

This website has good information about Measure 11 -- Oregon's Mandatory Sentencing requirements which have been in place since 1994. In this case we see how the combination of a flawed grand jury system and prosecutors who seek not justice but convictions is a recipe for wrongful convictions.

 

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