Shortly after 8pm on May 24th, 1989, Richard Johnston (Cindy James’s downstairs border) spent about an hour talking with Cindy about the heat sensor and the impending nurses’ strike. It was the last conversation he ever had with her.
Cindy told him she had five glorious days off with four of those days planned. He noticed she was “very relaxed” and was in a “very good” mood and “looked very good.” He listened as she told him, “Something big is going to happen soon. It has been too long.”
The morning after Cindy disappeared, Richard told Constable Jerry Anderson, “We had a mutual feeling and talked that it was due for something else to happen. We wanted to get the heat sensor hooked up as soon as possible because we felt something [perhaps a break-in] was probably going to happen on the weekend. I tried to emphasize positive thoughts with Cindy and that when these attacks etc. occur we are doing something wrong. We have to act as opposed to react and I stressed that to Cindy. We did brainstorming on several occasions. We came up with the idea of a motion detector so we would have some advance warning. That evolved into the heat sensor idea.”
After speaking with Richard, Cindy called Agnes (a friend) to make sure they (Agnes and her husband Tom) hadn’t forgotten about coming over for cards the next night.
“I told her we would be there at 10pm or shortly thereafter. Cindy said she had a lot of shopping to do and she had to put her paycheque in the bank but she would definitely be home by dark. She commented that it was almost dark at the time and I looked at my watch and it was 8:50pm.”
But when Agnes and Tom show up at Cindy’s house the next evening and toot the horn, Cindy won’t come to the window as she usually does…nor will she answer the front door when they knock on it several times. And her car will not be in the driveway either…but will be found parked in front of the bank where she deposited her paycheque earlier that day.
There will be blood on the driver’s door. And Cindy’s bankcard and transaction record will be lying underneath the car—eighteen inches from the driver’s side.
Cindy will be nowhere to be found.
Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My friend
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