Year of Manitoba landfill searches shows reconciliation a work in progress, families say

The yr that saw the remains of deuce number one Nations women brought place from a Manitoba landfill and a look get underway for the remains of a third showed how far reconciliation efforts have come — and how far they still need to go, the families say

Melissa Robinson, whose cousin Morgan Harris’s remains were among those recovered earlier this year, says she feels at peace now that the chapter of her life focused on searching the Prairie Green landfill outside Winnipeg is over.

Robinson said after having an initially tense relationship with Winnipeg police when they decided not to search for her cousin’s remains, her family feels they’ve now built trust with new police Chief Gene Bowers, who she says listens and has shown he’s “committed to the families.”

“When we talk about reconciliation, this is exactly it,” she said. “Action behind those words, not just, you know, empty words.”

Donna Bartlett, whose granddaughter Marcedes Myran’s partial remains were also found during the search of that landfill this year, said finding those remains — though difficult — brought her family some long-awaited finality.

However, she isn’t sure that what they went through changed anything when it comes to reconciliation with Indigenous peoples.

“I'm hoping it did. I really am hoping,” Bartlett said. “They’ve got these big plans, but nothing gets done, so reconciliation is kind of — to me, it's kind of not real.”

Harris, 39, and Myran, 26 — both originally from Long Plain First Nation — were among four women killed in 2022 by Jeremy Skibicki. He was convicted of first-degree murder in 2024 and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years after a weeks-long trial that heard he targeted vulnerable First Nations women before killing them and disposing of their remains.

Skibicki was also convicted of killing Rebecca Contois, 24, a member of O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation, and Ashlee Shingoose, 30, who was from St. Theresa Point Anisininew Nation, and whose identity was unconfirmed until this year.

Contois’s partial remains were found in garbage bins near Skibicki’s apartment and at Winnipeg’s Brady Road landfill, while a search for Shingoose’s remains at that landfill started recently.

Those developments brought renewed calls to also search that landfill for the remains of Tanya Nepinak, 31, who was last seen in 2011. Police conducted an unsuccessful six-day search for her remains there the following year. The province has since announced it plans to search for Nepinak’s remains once the search for Shingoose is done.

Bartlett says she hopes no one ever finds themselves in the position her family was in — and if they do, she hopes they don’t have to fight to recover their loved one’s remains. 

She also hopes more is done to protect vulnerable people such as her granddaughter, something echoed by Robinson, who questioned why it took the province so long to establish an emergency safe space for Indigenous women that is expected to open in the new year.

“Why are we still functioning the same way it was when my cousin was out on the streets?” Robinson said.

For the families of the women whose remains are still believed to be in a landfill, hearing news of other families bringing their loved ones home was difficult — even though it was what they hoped for.

“I felt happy when they found their loved ones. We were there, in the heart. We were there in prayers for them,” said Albert Shingoose, Ashlee Shingoose’s father. “[But] it was hurting.”

Sue Caribou, Tanya Nepinak’s aunt, says it felt like her family was being retraumatized.

“I'm grateful that they brought the loved ones home,” Caribou said. “But I was hurt, angry while it was happening because Tanya should have got the same treatment.”

While Caribou said she feels Winnipeg police have been working with her “in a good way” more recently, she’s still hesitant to trust them and other leaders — and she feels until her niece’s remains have been found, there has been no reconciliation for her family.

For Shingoose, who is now in Winnipeg to be closer to the search for his daughter’s remains, the trust he puts in the police now isn’t particularly high or low.

“We can’t put everything on top, and we can't put everything in the bottom. I have to [go] right in the middle,” he said, holding his hand out directly in front of him. 

He said he’s hopeful searchers will be able to recover his daughter’s remains.

“They say to me they're not going to quit until they find her.” Shingoose said. “I hope they keep that word.”

Reporter

---

---