What was and is the impact on you and the family on the mystery surrounding her death, and the publicity surrounding the tragedy? ~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack) For privacy reasons, I can only speak about myself. And for me it never goes away. It’s something I live with. I am also […]

People who knew her always felt she was holding information back. If it was true, why do you think she did that? ~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack) Cindy was scared.  She was being attacked and harassed and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.  During one attack, they mentioned going […]

Did you know during those years before her death the true extent of the torture she was going through? ~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack) No. I had not known just how much pain she was enduring at the time it was happening. Over the years I was only given enough sketchy details […]

What inspired you to explore the circumstances of your sister’s death all these years later? ~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack) I had no closure after the inquest…the verdict was undetermined. I was deep in grief and needed an answer. I realized not all of the facts had been presented at the inquest—and […]

Last August Ken MacQueen interviewed me for an article that was published in Maclean’s magazine—Canada’s Greatest Unsolved Mysteries…a special edition that came out before the end of 2013. The magazine contained an article about my sister’s unsolved case, Cindy James, and I’m very grateful for the exposure. You see, some of my siblings and I […]

LET me do my work each day; and if the darkened hours of despair overcome me, may I not forget the strength that comforted me in the desolation of other times. May I still remember the bright hours that found me walking over the silent hills of my childhood, or dreaming on the margin of […]

You have no idea how I would do almost anything to be able to talk with my sister Cindy …to hug her…to tell her I love her…and to bring her up-to-date with all the special things that have been happening in my family…the new additions, the awards, the trips… Twenty-two years ago today, Cindy. Never […]

If I had a career do-over I think I’d go to Crime Scene University and study forensic science. I recently watched a TV show on the Investigation Discovery channel and it took me right back to the days when I was researching for my book Who Killed My Sister, My Friend – entomological evidence, processing […]

During the process of grief, you are bombarded with many stressful situations, feelings and thoughts that continually test your inner strength. You may deal with one matter only to find yourself facing another. Thus, anger can compound as well as seem to spring up anew. It can be frightening. You may be surprised at its […]

At the time my sister (Cindy James) died and her body was found (on this day twenty-one years ago), it seemed that some of my family members weren’t sharing the same sorrow that I felt, or at least they weren’t showing it the same way. But, I now realize, none of us were ever psychologically […]