What would you like to tell me?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

First off, we need to be able to recognize Cindy’s case for what it was—beyond a distraught individual genuinely fearful for her life. She felt trapped, alone, confused, alienated, angry, guilty and ashamed. It doesn’t matter what clinical label was put on Cindy. She was a victim—a victim of society’s ignorance and unable to know where to turn for help or who to trust or what to do. Society failed Cindy through a lack of proper support over a span of years.
In another Blog post I will share more of what I told Ken.

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

Do you feel that case will ever “officially” be solved? What will it take to crack the case in the authorities eyes?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

I guess the police would need to be interested in solving the case. And at this point I don’t know that they are.
I wonder if they could look at DNA evidence on the cigarette butts found in her carport or from saliva on the licked envelopes that contained the threatening letters or the foreign hairs found on her body, etc. Or have the authorities destroyed all that evidence?
They were told to keep the case/file open because of the undetermined findings at the inquest. But I found out police closed the file and labeled it as suicide. So is there any evidence left for analysis?
After-death chemistry was not yet an area of study at the time of the [1990] inquest but I’d like to know if there is someone now who can interpret the written results of the samples (taken from her dead body) showing the relationship of free morphine to total morphine in her blood and her liver. –This would tell us how long it was before death occurred and whether or not she could have even taken morphine in pill form!

Coming soon… “What would you like to tell me?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

“Who killed Cindy James?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

It would be my own speculation and I can’t say without proof.

Coming soon… “Do you feel that case will ever ‘officially’ be solved? What will it take to crack the case in the authorities eyes?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine.

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

What can you tell me about how you reached your conclusion?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

I had so many questions. So I scrutinized the seven years of harassment with the perspective of wondering what could have been going on with Cindy that I wasn’t aware of at the time. And I also tried to see what the possibilities were as they related to how other people might have been involved. And I looked through every scrap of paper I could find relating to Cindy, and was relieved to discover more facts that would finally lead me down a path to closure.

Coming soon… “Who killed Cindy James?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

Do you have a suspect in mind?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

Yes.

Coming soon… “What can you tell me about how you reached your conclusion?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

Have you reached what you believe is a resolution of the mystery?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

After scrutinizing the evidence I do have a theory…

Coming soon… “Do you have a suspect in mind?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

The title of your book, Who Killed, implies that you are convinced this was a murder. Is this an accurate portrayal of your belief?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

I do believe there is no possible way that Cindy ended her life on her own.
Not one of her friends or acquaintances indicated there was a hint of suicide in her actions or conversations during the period leading up to the disappearance.
Her psychiatrist said there was no hint of a multiple personality.
She had massive doses of drugs in her body (including Flurazepam and morphine) …10x the amount necessary to kill her. And although Flurazepam pill residue was in her stomach, there was an injection site on her right arm at the elbow, making it possible that she could have been injected with the morphine. BUT it was never determined how the morphine got in her system—only a trace amount of morphine (from pills? or from diffusion back into the stomach via the blood stream from oral ingestion or injection?) was found in her stomach along with 3.3 milligrams of Flurazepam (an estimate of twenty 30mg capsules of Flurazepam). Shouldn’t there have been more morphine residue in her stomach if she swallowed morphine pills? And if she had done this to herself and swallowed liquid morphine wouldn’t there have been a container having liquid morphine residue near her body since she would have been sedated too soon to dispose of it nearby and tie herself up? And if she was injected, someone else had to have killed her because she would have been comatose before the end of injection (1½ ounces). And there were no traces of drugs found in her abandoned car or at the death scene. No containers with drug residue (not even of the Flurazepam), showing she would have carried them there – not in the pockets of the jacket she was partially laying on nor in the McDonald’s paper cup found nearby. Did an accomplice or unknown perpetrator take it away? And either of the levels of morphine and Flurazepam found in her system would have killed her (something she would have known as a nurse), so why would she have taken both? Or been given both?
Even if we suppose Cindy only swallowed the Flurazepam pills, someone else had to have injected her with the morphine. And in that case, according to the evidence, there is no way Cindy could have done the death scene alone!

Coming soon… “Have you reached what you believe is a resolution of the mystery?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

Can you describe how your sister’s personality changed over the years before her death?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

She never knew when something horrible would happen so she was mostly tense and fearful and nervous…constantly looking over her shoulder and trying not to be alone. She’d have flashbacks and nightmares that left her exhausted. And after the fire in her basement [in April 1986] she was so overwhelmed and distressed that she had a nervous breakdown and stopped eating. In fact, she was hospitalized several times [for six days in Lions Gate facility in North Vancouver in June 1985, and after that basement fire in 1986 she went to St Paul’s hospital, Riverview…and back to St Paul’s] and felt degraded and humiliated by it. In the year before her death she wondered aloud if the attempted strangulation and drugs had left her brain damaged…her memories were confused. Ultimately realizing betrayal by police, she didn’t want to involve them anymore. And she became suspicious of the motives of others…even of family members. She lived with an undercurrent of anger, but despite all the harassment, she tried to see herself as a survivor…not a victim…trying so hard to be self-sufficient and independent. To the end she was also a compassionate and devoted sister and friend, showing interest in my life…asking how I was doing and always offering an ear.

Hi Melanie. I’ve a quick question about this quote from you:
³In the year before her death she wondered aloud if the attempted strangulation and drugs had left her brain damaged; her memories were confused.²
My question: is the reference to “drugs” from her psychiatric hospitalization, or were there allegations that I missed that she was
drugged during some of the attacks against her?
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine (question to Melanie Hack)

I am referring to drugs injected and trauma experienced during attacks…they had left her with little or confused memories.

Coming soon… “The title of your book, Who Killed, implies that you are convinced this was a murder. Is this an accurate portrayal of your belief?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

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 cautious of what I say after seeing how words can be twisted and misunderstood.

Today I like to believe I would have been able to help Cindy more if I had known more of what was happening to her. Back then I had had a lot of faith in the police and other assistance she was getting and was not conscious of how I was being manipulated by certain people. At the inquest, it dawned on me how early on in the harassment the police were questioning the truth of what Cindy was telling them.

Coming soon…“Can you describe how your sister’s personality changed over the years before her death?”
~Ken MacQueen, Maclean’s magazine

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James

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 after other members of the family…she was not going to put any of our lives in danger.

Not to mention the fact she was being questioned about doing these attacks herself…so she was very cautious of who she could turn to.

How do you get help from police if there are times when you need their help and they label you as the crazy lady? Like it’s a big joke.

I don’t want people to think the sister that I loved and appreciated was a scheming type of personality, especially not with malevolence. I don’t want people to be left with that impression because it is an unfair judgment.

Coming soon…“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

Melanie Hack
Author of Who Killed My Sister, My Friend
Read an excerpt now
TV Shows and Clips about the Death of Cindy James