The Trail Went Cold - Episode 320 - Verna Bjerky

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 15 March 2023

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

May 2, 1981. Hope, British Columbia. After spending the night at a friend’s house, 16-year old Verna Bjerky leaves on a trip to visit her boyfriend, but even though she plans on hitchhiking to her destination, she never arrives. Five months later, some of Verna’s personal belongings are discovered in a remote area, but there is no trace of her body. During this time period, a serial killer named Clifford Olson is charged and convicted of the murders of eleven children which took place in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. After he is sent to prison, Olson hints at possible involvement in Verna’s disappearance, but he is never conclusively linked to her case and Verna’s remains are never found. On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we travel back to our podcast’s home country of Canada to explore the unsolved disappearance of Verna Bjerky, an Indigenous victim who has always been mistakenly classified as “white” in all of the official sources. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Upper Fraser Valley detachment of the RCMP at (604) 792-4611 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477). Additional Reading: https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/3070dfbc.html https://www.hopestandard.com/news/remembering-verna-loss-felt-through-the-generations/ https://www.services.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/missing-disparus/case-dossier.jsf?case=2014001314&id=13 https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/10/26/Police-find-missing-girls-property/6368372920400/ https://www.upi.com/Archives/1981/10/27/Some-unidentified-personal-effects-belonging-to-Verna-Bjerky/7169373006800/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/465738032/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/472013957/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/507635462/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/507635466/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/733002984/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/536942896/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/561496224/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/561484985/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/464047804/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Olson “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. “The Trail Went Cold” is doing a weekly livestream show on Vokl every Thursday from 7:00-8:00 PM ET as part of their “True Crime Thursday” line-up. For more information, please visit their website. “The Trail Went Cold” is going to be appearing on podcast row at “Crimecon UK” at the Tower Bridge, Leonardo Royal Hotel & Spa in London on June 10-11, 2023, as well as “Crimecon” at the World Center Marriott in Orlando, Florida on September 22-24, 2023. To get a 10 % discount on the purchase of tickets to either event, please use our specialized promo code, “COLD23”, by visiting https://www.crimecon.co.uk or https://www.crimecon.com. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

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0:00.0	May 2nd, 1981. Hope British Columbia
0:05.8	After spending the night at a friend's house,
0:08.0	16 year old Verna Bjorki leaves on a hitchhiking trip to visit her boyfriend
0:12.4	but never arrives. Five months later, some
0:15.6	of Verna's belongings are discovered in a remote area, but there is no trace of her body.
0:20.7	A serial killer named Clifford Olson is soon charged and convicted for the murders of 11 children,
0:26.0	which took place in British Columbia during this time period, and even though there is speculation that Verna was one of his victims. This is never conclusively proven and she
0:35.2	remains a missing person. After that, the trail went cold. Oh, uh, I'm not. Oh, uh,
0:54.0	uh,
0:55.0	uh, uh,
0:56.0	uh, uh,
0:58.0	uh, uh, uh, uh, uh,
1:04.0	uh, okay. Oh, uh, Hello everyone and welcome to our latest episode of the Trail went cold.
1:19.0	I'm your host Robin Warder and today we're going to be traveling back to our
1:23.8	podcast Home Country at Canada to explore an unsolved missing persons case
1:28.4	the 1981 disappearance of Verna Bjerke. I received a request to cover this one from a listener named
1:35.6	Madeline Shadine, who happens to be related to Verna Bjerki through their grandparents.
1:41.2	Back in September, I released an episode which focused on missing and murdered indigenous women from Nunavut and the Northwest Territories, and discussed how one of Canada's biggest issues is their epidemic of violence against
1:53.5	indigenous victims and the lack of attention these stories often receive
1:57.3	from law enforcement and the media. Well you're not going to find Verna Bjerkie's
2:02.0	name on any lists of missing and murdered indigenous women,
2:05.5	girls, and two-spirited people, because she was mistakenly described as white on her missing persons report,
	...

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