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Prostitute murder total may go up
By Peter Smith-Calgary Sun
Sunday, September 23, 2001
Vancouver police investigating the disappearance of 31 street
prostitutes from the city's notorious drug-infested red-light district concede
the number could be much higher.
And some reports say more officers have been assigned to the investigation
to establish if the women have been murdered by a serial killer.
Wayne Leng, a crusader who's spent years trying to promote efforts to find
out what happened to the women, welcomes the new initiative.
"The families and friends of at least another dozen women who have
gone missing from the same area -- and in similar circumstances -- want their
names added to the list," Leng said. "These new moves I hope indicate
an attempt to really get to the bottom of this now."
Leng has spent years trying to find out what happened to the women,
including his personal friend, Sarah, 29, a one-time Calgary exotic dancer, who
disappeared April 14, 1998.
"I hate to hear more women have been added to the list, but
increasing the task force up to 16 is a good move," he said.
All the original 31 missing women were involved in Vancouver's sex trade
and were drug addicts, many supporting their drug needs through prostitution.
Meanwhile, a new book scheduled to be published next month strongly
supports a theory featured two years ago in a Calgary Sun special report that
the women were taken to sea on freighters as sex slaves.
In his book Bad Date -- The Lost Girls of Vancouver's Low Track, author
Trevor Greene quotes many street women who believe the missing prostitutes were
taken aboard freighters and dumped at sea.
"Until the living or dead bodies of the disappeared women start
appearing, it is one of the most likely explanations, and it is what many of the
citizens of (Vancouver area) Low Track are suggesting," he wrote.
Greene quotes a source close to the red-light district describing
prostitutes going on board a ship in the harbour.
"They dope her up, she overdoses or they overdose her, then it's a
midnight burial at sea," says the source.
Bad Date:
The Lost Girls of Vancouver's Low Track | |
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