The Box-Cutter Murder: Gladys Wakabayashi

Twelve-year-old Elisa Wakabayashi waited for two hours for her mother to pick her up after school. Ordinarily, her mother arrived promptly at 3:00 p.m. At 5:00 p.m., Elisa called her father to give her a ride home. When they let themselves into the house, they found Gladys Wakabayashi lying on her back in a pool of blood.

Wakabayashi House — The Wakabayashi house on Shaughnessy’s Selkirk Street, Eve Lazarus photo, 2014

Murder:

There were multiple wounds to her chest and abdomen, and one had pierced her liver. Her arms and legs had also been cut. Her throat had been slashed so severely that the blade had cut through skin and muscle, severing her neck and spinal cord. All of the deep neck structures, including the airway, carotid arteries, and jugular veins, had been cut. There were cuts on her right hand and left arm where she had tried to fend off the attack. The thick carpet was soaked with her blood.

It was June 24, 1992, and 41-year-old Gladys Wakabayashi, was Vancouver’s 15th homicide of the year.

“It’s the most gruesome murder I’ve ever seen. It was really hard to understand. Everybody we talked to said Gladys Wakabayashi was well liked, kind, and a compassionate lady. It had to be someone who hated her with a passion that’s hard to imagine.” Veteran Vancouver Police Detective Murn MacLennan, The Province, July 13, 1992.

Gladys Wakabayashi:

Gladys, born Miao Feng Ling, was the third child of Taiwanese billionaire Y.S. Miao,. She came to Canada in 1976 to study piano and, two years later, married Shinji Wakabayashi, an executive with Japan Airlines. The couple separated in 1990 but remained on good terms.

Veteran Vancouver Police detective Murn MacLennan told a reporter that it was the most gruesome murder he’d ever seen. He said: “It was really hard to understand. Everybody we talked to said she was well liked, kind, and a compassionate lady. It had to be someone who hated her with a passion that’s hard to imagine.

Detectives found a massive amount of blood, a bloody footprint on the bathroom floor made by a woman’s high-heeled shoe. They thought it was someone Gladys knew and trusted because she had let the killer into her dressing room, and they started looking closer to home.

Police found messages on the Wakabayashis’ answering machine calling Gladys “love” and “darling” and telling her not to call him back. Shinji Wakabayashi later identified the voice as belonging to their friend Derek James.

Jean James:

Jean James found out, and rather than take it out on Derek or even tell him she knew about the affair, she began to plan her revenge.

Retired homicide detective Rick Crook says Jean James popped up on their radar early in the investigation. But while they were sure she was the killer, they had no forensic evidence linking her to this well-planned, cold-blooded murder.