Evelyn Roche got off the East Broadway bus and was stabbed to death two blocks from her house on April 3, 1958. This podcast is from a chapter in Cold Case Vancouver: The City’s Most Baffling Unsolved Murders and includes an interview with Evelyn’s daughter Sharon.
Evelyn’s murder terrorized the city. VPD Chief George Archer warned that a “sex fiend” was on the loose, that he believed that he would murder again, and that women should travel in pairs or be met by a male escort if they were coming home after dark.
mother of two:
Evelyn married Richard in 1955 and they moved into their house just days before she was murdered. And in what has happened way too many times, Evelyn was vilified in the press. Reporters said she left her two children alone in the house. The implication was that she went off to party, that some how she had invited her own murder.
In 2014, I tracked down Evelyn’s two children, Sharon who was 16 and Frank, 14 at the time of their mother’s murder. I wanted to know what happened to them, how they had coped with this senseless loss.
Sharon has sadly passed away, but back then we talked at length, and with the permission of her brother Frank, her interview is included in the podcast.
Went to the post office:
On the night she was murdered, Evelyn had asked her kids if they wanted to come downtown to the post office with her, but they said no, they wanted to watch a show on television. The last words that Sharon remembers saying to her mother was “Mum, please don’t forget the grapes.”
Evelyn was stabbed in the neck, chest and back, each wound delivered with such force that the blade had entered her body to the hilt. She had been sexually assaulted. Two brown paper bags were found near her body. One contained Sharon’s grapes.
Show notes:
Sponsor: Forbidden Vancouver Walking Tours
If you have any information about these murders please call Vancouver Police at 604-717-3321, or if you wish to remain anonymous, call crime stoppers at 1-800-222-8477 or visit the website solvecrime.ca
Intro & voiceovers: Mark Dunn
Music: Lament by DarkPiano.com
Sound effects: High school ambience by SoundEffectsfactory
Interview: Sharon Harder, Evelyn Roche’s daughter
PSAs:
- Metro Vancouver Crime Stoppers
- Vancouver Police Museum and Archives
Promo: Blood, Sweat & Fear: The Story of Inspector Vance
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