February 5, 2024 • 37 mins
In February of 1993, 70-year-old Anthony Dolff was found murdered in his home in Saskatchewan, Canada. That morning, indigenous sisters Odelia and Nerissa Quewezance were picked up by police. The two were held at the station for five days and questioned repeatedly without counsel - even though someone else had confessed to the killing. “These were two young indigenous women trying to cope with white police officers, all male,” says their attorney, James Lockyer. “And on the basis of those unrecorded statements that the police alleged they gave, they were convicted the following year."
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
On February twenty fifth, nineteen ninety three, police were called
to a house in a remote area in Saskatchewan, Canada.
They arrived to a horrific and bloody scene. Seventy year
old Joseph Dolph was lying face down on his bedroom
floor dead. He had been beaten and stabbed multiple times.
(00:26):
The house was in shambles and there had obviously been
a violent struggle that morning. O'delia and Nerissa Cusance and
their cousin Jason Kashane were picked up by police. The
sisters were held at the station for five days and
questioned repeatedly without counsel.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
These were two young Indigenous women trying to cope with
police officers. White police officers, all male.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
The interrogations were not recorded, and after days of questioning,
both women signed statements admitting to taking part in the killing.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
And on the basis of those unrecorded statements that the
police alleged they gave. After a trial before a jud John,
of course, not surprisingly an all white jury, they were
convicted the following year.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
From LoVa for good this is wrongful conviction with Maggie
Freeling today Odelia and Narissa Cusance o'dellia, Narissa Cusants are
(01:41):
sisters born two years apart and members of the Salto
First Nation. They grew up on the Keiscous Reserve in Saskatchewan, Canada,
along with an older brother and three other sisters.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
And growing up in Kiscous, we all were called the
village kids. We lived in a village.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
This is Odelia, the older of the two, born in
nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
Me and Narissa did not have our mother involved in
our life, but our father was involved in till the
day he passed. He was always there for us.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
I never actually knew my mother, but my dad was.
He was the best thing for me.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And that's Narissa. The sisters have always been close and
both girls adored their father.
Speaker 5 (02:32):
He was. He's quite a big man. I guess he's
six footy three. He was. He's really into sports.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
He's a hockey player himself, a basketball player, and he
used to be coached.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
On a team on a reserve.
Speaker 4 (02:44):
I mean, we didn't have nothing to eat or no power,
you know, as long as he was there, and that's
that's what mattered to me.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
He did his best. He wasn't perfect. Nobody's perfect.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Life for the girls growing up was rough, Canada's Indigenous
populations have long faced systemic racism, poverty, violence, and substance
addiction were rampant on the reserve where they lived.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Seeing people relatives trying to commit suicide, being babysat while
our father trusted someone, and then having a relative commit
suicide shoot himself. And we were little kids getting put
in a pat and you know it's we had a
tough life.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
But the cues On siblings looked out for each other.
Odelia especially tried to protect her younger sisters.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
I love my sisters, and I remember times where we
did go hungry. We always used to tell each other
to stay, you know, be strong, be strong. Sometimes times
it was tough.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Like generations of family members before them, Odelia and Nourissa
were sent away to residential schools at a very young age, like.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
My dad couldn't raise all of us kids on his own,
And then we were sent to our grandparents and then
to the residential schools. We went to the Bread Boarding School,
and and there's one called Maraval Boarding School that we
went to on Cows's first nation. You know, we were
as saying it was only eight and I don't even know,
I was so young when I went, and all I
(04:28):
remember is loneliness.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Canada's Indian residential school system, as it was called, was
established in the eighteen seventies with the goal of assimilating
indigenous children into white society. The schools were run by Catholic, Anglican, Methodist,
and Presbyterian churches. For children like Odelia Nourissa, who had
grown up surrounded by extended family and tribal elders on
(04:56):
the reserve, being dropped into a Christian school education system
was total culture shock.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
They take away your esteem, they take away everything because
it's like it's an institution and you know, all a
bunch of young kids that are you know, were just
children being being told to get up at certain time
in the morning, going to church, going doing all this stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
In your kid students were forced to sing and pray
in Latin while their own cultural and spiritual beliefs were
stifled or beaten out of them. For those who didn't conform,
punishment was swift and harsh.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
And I remember though, like one time, wanting to go
to the bathroom and you know, I got put in
the middle of the dorm hat to nail for hours.
You know, as a child, I used to, you know,
like eight seven years old, wanting to wishing to die.
That's terrible. Well who do you turn to, you know?
But we survived it. We survived it.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Many survivors of the resident school system recall being severely
beaten and repeatedly sexually assaulted by supervisors and then nearissa.
Speaker 6 (06:08):
I think I've read that you actually you have like
a spine problem with your back because of what happened
to you at residential school.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Yeah, from trauma. From my body is wasn't quite developed,
so my bones are kind of whatever.
Speaker 6 (06:24):
And that's from being attacked at the school, from being beaten, like.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
Every blows to my body, it wasn't formed or I
guess I remember even as a child, I used to
wonder why God was so mean? Now took a kid.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
The last of these schools was closed in nineteen ninety six,
but not before generations of Indigenous children had been permanently scarred,
both physically and emotionally by their treatment. This arguably contributed
to the system disenfranchisement of Indigenous people in Canada, creating
a highly vulnerable population. How old were y'all when you
(07:20):
left the school and how did you get out of there?
Speaker 3 (07:23):
My mother passed died when I was fourteen, and I
think I don't know how fifteen when I left boarding school.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
Ohdelia dropped out of school and moved to Edmonton to
live with family.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
There.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
She continued to try to look out for her little sister,
but Nourissa was still having a hard time at school,
and she'd been getting into trouble with the law starting
at age thirteen.
Speaker 6 (07:47):
What did you go to prison for the first time?
Speaker 4 (07:50):
First time was I was young. A founder me for
a stolen vehicle and that's where it escalated. There was
nothing violence. I never had any violence on my record
this till my adult charge.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Her time spent in prison started. Noarissa on the road
to alcohol and hard drugs at a young age.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
I never was introduced that till I went to prison.
Like sure, I used to smoke to odd joints once
in a while, but like take the odd pill. You know,
I became an addict in prison.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
By nineteen ninety three, O'delia was twenty one and Norissa
was eighteen. They had both moved back to the Keyscous
Reserve and were living with their sisters, Orlina and her
husband and kids. Their fifteen year old cousin Jason Kashane,
lived across the road. On the night of February twenty fourth,
nineteen ninety three, Jason stole fifteen tablets of the drug
(08:47):
Restoral from his grandma. He Odelia, and Norissa all took
the sedative, which is used to treat insomnia. It can
cause severe drowsiness and went combined with alcohol periodic back outs.
Later that evening, Jason called an acquaintance, seventy year old
Joseph Dolph, to come and pick them up. Dolf had
(09:09):
worked as a maintenance man at Saint Philip's, one of
the residential schools they had attended. He was known to
regularly invite young Indigenous women and girls to his home.
That night, Dolf wanted to party and they all got
in his car.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
He picked them up, brought them to his fairly remote
home in Comsuck, Saskatchewan if I was very remote, and
provided them with beer and whiskey.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
This is James Lockyer.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
I'm Innocents Canada's Council for the Cuzan's Sisters, Adealer of Nursa.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
With the restaurant already in their systems, the sisters became
more and more inebriated. Later, they would have a hard
time remembering everything that occurred that night. Jason later testified
that Dolf and Odelia left to go get beer. When
they returned, they all continued drinking, finishing off a large
bottle of whiskey Dolf provided, and it seemed he had
(10:06):
an agenda.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
And during the course of the evening, Dolf tried to
persuade Adelia.
Speaker 7 (10:13):
And Nerissa to have sex with him.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
They refused and it led to some dispute between them.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Around one o'clock in the morning, they persuaded Dolf to
drive them all home, and.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
On the way home, Dolf realized that he had three
hundred dollars missing from his wallet, and he decided to
turn around.
Speaker 7 (10:34):
And go back home.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Back at the house, Dolf accused the three of stealing
the money from him. They denied it, and an argument ensued.
The next day, the police were called to Joseph Dolf's home.
When they entered, they found the place completely trashed, with
furniture turned over and talcum powder sprinkled all around. Dolf's
body was face down in the bedroom. He'd been stabbed
(10:58):
over a dozen times in the chest, abdomen, back and
left arm, a knife was still in his stomach and
a phone cord was wrapped around his neck. There were
blunt force injuries on his head and a fracture near
his right eye. When the police started asking around the
community about who could have been involved.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
They quickly ascertained that the two Cusant's sisters and Jason
had been at his house that night.
Speaker 7 (11:25):
They were all three arrested.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
That morning. O'delia, Narissa, and Jason were taken to the
Kamsack Police Detachment by the RCMP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
The sisters were stripped to their underwear and placed in
concrete cells with only raincoats to wear. Later, they were
given sweatpants and sweatshirts. Both women spoke with lawyers who
(11:52):
told the police that their clients were not to be questioned.
The next day, the Justice of the Peace ordered that
the cis be remanded to the nearest jail. This was Friday.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
However, the police ignored that order and kept them until
the following Tuesday in the police detachment, so that they
were a matter of eight steps from numerous all white,
all male police officers in the Camsack detachment in Canada,
If you want to hold someone for more than twenty
(12:25):
four hours in police custody you have to get judicial authorization.
And they were held in the cells there for a
total of five nights. And on these most unpleasant cells
which I've seen, they have a seventeenth century appearance to them.
Very thick white concrete walls, probably twelve to fifteen inches thick,
(12:48):
with bars going from ceiling to ground, and you know,
hard cold steel bunks with no bedding, so you know,
a very its very nature, highly intimidating for both of them.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Meanwhile, their cousin, Jason, was also being questioned, and on
the very first day.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Jason confessed to the homicide, and his confession was recorded
on tape, a tape recording that somehow was not available.
When it came to the questioning of Nourissa and Adelia
to being the one who did the stabbings.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
The sisters were told that Jason had confessed to the
murder and that he implicated them as well, which was
later found not to be true. The two were questioned
repeatedly by the RCMP over the next four days.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
They have memory being extremely scared, of course, and frightened
around all these men. These what to them were big
burly white men, continually bringing them out of the cells
and questioning them again, and putting them back in and
questioning them again.
Speaker 7 (13:53):
Over day after day. They had no lawyers, and.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
The police knew what they wanted, They knew what they
were doing.
Speaker 7 (14:03):
They had to.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Get these two girls to say things that somehow tied
them into mister Dolph's murder. The police alleged that they
gave verbal statements not recorded that slowly but surely amounted
to more incriminating statements. So as I say, they got
ad Elier to admit one stab wound out of more
(14:24):
than forty, how did they get.
Speaker 6 (14:26):
The girls to confess to this?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
There's no doubt there was intimidating taxics used. These were
two young Indigenous women trying to cope with police officers,
white police officers.
Speaker 7 (14:39):
All male.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
More than that, they were both victims of the residential
school system. They were highly vulnerable individuals. Well never really
know exactly what happened because none of it was recorded,
they had no lawyers. It was made clearer than what
they wanted to hear. The policeman wrote out what they
claimed the girls were saying. One of Nourissa's statements was
(15:04):
clearly not her words, and on the basis of those
unrecorded statements that the police alleged they gave. They were
convicted the following year after a trial before a jud Johann,
of course, not surprisingly an all white jury.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling.
You can listen to this and all the Lover for
Good podcasts one week early and ad free by subscribing
to LoVa for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Adelia and Nourissa testified at their trials. The trouble is
that they had it made clear to them that it
was not in their interest to try and challenge the
versions of events given by the RCMP officers in front
of the jury, because if they did, they'd be disbelieved.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
After the years they'd spent at residential schools, the girls
were conditioned to succumb to authority and believed no one
would help them.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
They were told to stay in line as to how
they were treated by the police, who of course testified
that they treated them well, etc. Etc. For those five days,
even though they shouldn't have been in the police station
for four of them, and no one really seemed to
see much wrong.
Speaker 7 (16:44):
Without a trial. Certainly the trial judge didn't.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Her name was Justice Gunn was her name. So they
tried to fall into step, you might say, with what
the RCMP officers said. Not entirely, but they did their
best to so that they're claim that they had not
been involved in mister Dolph's murder will be more likely believed.
And this was classic for those times that Indigenous people
(17:10):
were told by their own lawyers that you know, if
it's your word against the police, no one's going to
believe you.
Speaker 6 (17:20):
So for people in the US who don't know about
the systemic abuses of Indigenous people in Canada, can you
describe that a little bit?
Speaker 7 (17:29):
Well, it's not unlike your country.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's very much a colonial history where we colonize the
original peoples of our part of the continent, and you
did the same in your part of the continent. The
RCMP has in the past and still to this day,
engages in systemic racism towards Indigenous peoples. That's acknowledged publicly,
i might say, with some reluctance, but nevertheless acknowledged. The
(17:54):
case of Adelia and Urus are just smacks of this.
Here we have two young girls, both indigenous. I mean
if you or I had been the ones arrested in
February of nineteen ninety three, they wouldn't have held us
in the police cells for five days in complete violation
of a judicial order.
Speaker 7 (18:14):
They're victims of.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
Systemic discrimination, and it obviously includes within it then the
failure of the police to make any attempt to record
any of the interviews, despite the fact that the recording
equipment was right there in the police station. Their failure
to obey a judicial order for day after day after day,
their failure to in any way document the conditions of
(18:40):
both a dealer and Urissa, that their level of intoxication
on arrest, their level of drug taking, and overall the
fact that it's become known in the last twenty years
that false confessions are a regular feature of wrongful convictions,
and false confession above all come from those who are
(19:03):
vulnerable in the first place.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Okay, So going back to the trial, o'delia and Narisso
were tried in the Court of Queen's Benson, Yorkton before
Madame Justice Ellen Gunn, And as you said earlier, it
was an all white jury, and we've heard how the
sisters were basically forced to incriminate themselves at trial, But
what did their lawyers present in defense.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Their defense was that the two women were both drunk
at the time and therefore their responsibility meant they should
only be convicted of manslaughter. It was like a sort
of a semi surrender defense.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
So they didn't bring up a foss confession.
Speaker 7 (19:44):
No, they did not.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Jason was called by the Crown as a witness, and
indeed when he testified at trial, he implicated himself and
said that he was the one who had stabbed mister Doff.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
At trial, Jason told a more complete story of what
happened that night. Jason said, once they all returned to
the house, Joseph Dolph went looking for his missing money.
They all got into an altercation and Narissa hit Dolf
on the head with a porcelain ornament, which broke in
a tea kettle. O'dela hit him with a whiskey bottle.
(20:21):
Jason punched Dolf, who was going after Narissa, then followed
him into the bedroom and choked him with a telephone cord.
Then he grabbed a knife from the kitchen and stabbed
Dolf repeatedly, finally leaving the knife in his body. He
said o'delia and Nourissa were in another room together crying.
After Jason finished assaulting Dolf, the three trashed the house.
(20:45):
Then Jason took Dolph's keys and drove them all home.
It would later come out that Jason was told to
implicate o'dela Noarissa by saying they had hit Dolf. According
to Jason, they actually hadn't. He had been the sole attacker. However,
Jason's testimony did corroborate the sister's assertion that they were
(21:08):
not the ones who had killed Joseph Dolph. He was.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
He'd already pleaded guilty to the crime. He was a
fifteen year old, so he pleaded guilty under the Young
Offender's Act and received a sentence of five years. So
the real killer was in for five years, and at
his age, he shouldn't.
Speaker 7 (21:27):
Have been in for longer than that. I would hasten
to add.
Speaker 6 (21:32):
Was he asked directly if the girls did and did
he say no or was he just not yes?
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (21:36):
And he said no, they did not.
Speaker 7 (21:37):
Yes, he said he's the win who stabbed them.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Wow.
Speaker 6 (21:41):
So even though they were not implicated at the trial
by him, they're still convicted. Yes, On February fourth, nineteen
(22:07):
ninety four, Odelia and Narissa were convicted of second degree
murder and sentenced to life in prison with the possibility
of parole in ten years. While she was incarcerated, Odela
stayed connected with her partner, Jay, whom she'd known since
she was eighteen. In two thousand and one, she gave
birth to their daughter and six years later twin girls.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
My oldest daughter, Hayley, she lived in prison for two
years with me.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
What was that like living with your daughter in prison?
Speaker 3 (22:48):
I was just grateful she was there with me.
Speaker 8 (22:50):
Yes, it was like, you know, but do you know
what my daughter today, she's very outspoken, and she had
a lot of Auntie and Cook Coombs in there to
take care of her, you know, like she was allowed
to be a child in there.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
Were there other were there other women with kids?
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Yeah? Wow?
Speaker 6 (23:12):
And so once your daughters, you know, left prison and
were older, who were they living with And what was
that like to try and parent from behind bars?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
My daughters they were living with their father and he
took care of them, and he brought them to visit
me and read a couple months. I talked on a
phone with them a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
How do you do being a dad?
Speaker 3 (23:34):
I think he did pretty good. Kind of spoiled their girls,
but in a good way though.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
While in prison, Odelia also earned her ged, completed a
number of programs, and worked in the library, horticulture, kitchen,
and daycare. She grew to be respected as a leader
by both prisoners and staff. Norissa earned a degree in
adult education from the University of Saskatoon while at the
(24:06):
Edmonton Institution for Women, the first incarcerated person to graduate
from the university and attend her own convocation. She also
earned a degree in animal welfare and worked as a
dog trainer. Nearly ten years into their sentence, the sisters
hit a milestone, so.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
As of February twenty fourth, two thousand and three, they
were eligible for Pearl.
Speaker 7 (24:33):
They didn't get it, and when they did.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Release them a couple of times they imposed these onerous
conditions on them, which not surprisingly, they violated. So in
twenty twenty, above the time David Milgard came to me,
they both served more than they were actually by then.
That's served twenty eight years of their sentences.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
In James, can you explain who David Milgard is and
how he became involved in this case.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
David was a person who had spent twenty three years
in prison in Canada for a great murder he did
not commit, and ever since his exoneration, continued to advocate
for the wrongly convicted and Nourissa and Adelia Cusance approached
him in I think in the summer of twenty twenty,
and David then asked me if I would take on
(25:23):
their case?
Speaker 1 (25:24):
So, why did you believe in their innocence? What convinced
you of that?
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Taking into account the whole systemic racism involved in this,
it wasn't a hard one. Once I had a chance
to read the trial transcripts, the case to me stank
When I saw that they had been held in custody
in the police station for five days. That in itself
did it for me. I'd never heard of such a thing, never.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
And so what was your strategy for getting them out?
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Adelia and Nurissa had had their appeals dismissed in nineteen
ninety five, a year after their convictions. Paragraph judgment of
the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, which kind of shows you
how much attention was given to their case. The only
method of challenging a conviction in Canada after all appeal
processes have been exhausted, and after their appeals have been lost,
(26:17):
their only avenue of recourse was to go to the
Minister of Justice, who's in our capital city in Ottawa,
and ask him to review their convictions and determine whether
they constituted the mis charriage of justice.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
So you did that in twenty twenty two, and then
what did you present to the minister.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
We gave a whole list of reasons as to why
these convictions constitutedious charriage of justice. We pointed out that
Canada's treatment of Indigenous peoples and this case was a
classic abuse of Indigenous peoples, especially women. We talked about
the impacts of systemic discrimination on the two of them
(26:59):
in the investigation.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
And so to this day, does Jason still maintain that
o'dellia and Nerissa were not involved.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
Yes, I've met Jason a couple of times. Of course,
he's now in his mid forties. He's had a pretty
difficult life since and bears besides the guilt of stabbing
mister Dolph, for the guilt of having implicated Nurisa and
Adelia by what he did. But yes, he maintains they
(27:30):
had nothing to do with it, and his statement to
that effect, which he put in writing, enabled us to
bring a release application for them until the Minister made
his final decision.
Speaker 7 (27:42):
And I'm glad to say that on March.
Speaker 2 (27:45):
Twenty seventh of twenty twenty three, more than thirty years
after their original arrests and imprisonment, they were released on
bail and they're both presently on bail.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
The situation these two women found themselves in is unfortunately
not unusual. According to Canada's Office of the Congressional Investigator,
over fifty percent of incarcerated women in Canada are Indigenous.
Indigenous people are historically more likely to be arrested for
serious crimes, are rarely tried by their peers, and are
(28:23):
more likely to be convicted. And like at the residential
schools where they were first institutionalized, Indigenous people continue to
face systemic racism and abuse throughout the prison and parole system.
Speaker 6 (28:42):
Does the law in Canada seem to be more understanding
now of the plight of Indigenous folks and what they
have gone through and suffered, you know, particularly like o'dellia
Narissa winding up in a situation like this because of
the systemic abuse.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
To some extent, the answer is yes. Having said that,
we have a huge problem in Canada because the Indigenous
percentages in the prisons are going up and up and
up year by year by year. The denials of parole
for the Indigenous are going up and up and up.
(29:21):
The number of Indigenous being found to be dangerous offenders
and subject to life sentences are going up and up
and up. So whilst there may be more recognition, particularly
with the present government that talks a great deal about
the need for truth and reconciliation with our Indigenous people,
at the criminal justice level, things are just terribly.
Speaker 5 (29:43):
Wrong, right.
Speaker 6 (29:44):
You know, parole here is pretty awful as well. How
is it in Canada? Why is it so bad if
you're Indigenous?
Speaker 7 (29:51):
Because they don't release you.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
That's the SATs.
Speaker 7 (29:53):
I mean, there are many reasons for this, but.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
A very simple part of a systemic discrimination is they
have ah whole system whereby they assess what they call
the criminogenic factors of the individual, the likelihood that they
will re offend if released, and the assessments are conducted
according to the thinking and customs of the white man,
(30:17):
not the thinking, customs and cultures of the Indigenous, and
It's been proved very clearly that that means that the
Indigenous are always overassessed in terms of the likelihood of
their reoffending, which automatically is then used to justify denying
them parole. And then when they do release you, they
(30:38):
release you on conditions that are almost bound to be violated.
No alcohol, no drugs, curfews, those kinds of things which
people who are Indigenous likely not very stable, don't have
stable environments to return to, are going to be living
potentially on reserves, almost bound to violate drinking, and you're
(31:01):
on a life sentence. You're back in two three years
before you're next entitled to even be considered for parole.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Even though Odelia and Narissa were released in March, they
have not been exonerated of Joseph Dolf's murder. They're still
living under parole conditions while they await ministerial review, hoping
for the decision that would finally allow them to live
fully free.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
For me and my sister at this time, like I know,
all I have is to wait and is waked and wait.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Odelia is now back at home with Jay and their
twin daughters. Nourissa is living with a good friend an
advocate Kim Bowden and his wife Rhonda.
Speaker 4 (31:44):
He's the Congress of Amagual People of Canada Vice president
and yeah, he's myself is I just love him and Rohnda. No,
he's a great man and I usually have a hard
time trusting man.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
After nearly three decades in prison, both sisters, now fifty
one and forty nine, are doing their best to adjust
to life outside of prison walls while on parole.
Speaker 4 (32:18):
But for myself, it's a real It's different because I'm
so institutionalized that I'm used to everything coming. Like if
I had to go see the doctor, I just had
to go across across the road and or go get
groceries just across the hallway. Maybe so, and now here
it's it's hard to do. I kind of I've only
ridden on a bus once since I've been out here.
(32:40):
I have really bad anxiety, and I noticed that I
get really irritable and stuff like that, so I don't
really like being around people.
Speaker 6 (32:47):
I understand that you were You were in a prison
with a lot of people for a long time.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
How about you, Adelia, what kinds of things that you're
a mom? What's that like?
Speaker 3 (32:56):
It's been a challenge because I've been away from them
for so much many years. So it's rekindling with my
daughters and getting to know them. And you know, there's
there's a lot of resentments, you know, and I feel
them like I we have a good relationship, like I
try to be my best, fights my girls and you know,
give them what they want. But it's hard.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
It's hard to.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Be honest, you know what. I feel useless. Sometimes I
feel like I, you know, so went down institutionalize.
Speaker 9 (33:28):
I don't know what to do on my own. Sometimes
I want to do things, make things different. I'm still
hopeful about, you know, my future. But like I said,
it's it's hard.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
It's a struggle when you just yeah, like great, now
I'm starting to get getting getting out of my bedroom
as I'm so used to being in a room.
Speaker 5 (33:49):
Yeah, that's what I do too. I spend a lot
of room time. I do a lot of sell time. Still.
Speaker 6 (33:55):
Yeah, yeah, I understand that. I hear that from a
lot of people who have been inside. It's it's it's scary.
Speaker 7 (34:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:02):
I always tell myself you're okay, you're safe. Now, You're okay,
it's going to be okay. I always tell myself that
my younger solf.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Of Delia and Narissa have found strength in going to conferences,
meeting other Axonna reeves and telling their story.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I want to help people and I want to be
an advocate for women and children.
Speaker 5 (34:27):
I remember when I was younger, when I was in jail,
Like even before I went to BC, I used to say,
one day, I'm.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
Going to climb that mountain, you know, And that's what
it meant for me. It is like, you know, one
day I'm going to get there to the top, you know.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
So where is the top of that mountain for you?
Speaker 4 (34:45):
Well, I'm there already.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Just as they did when they were children, the Q
Zone sisters are still looking out for each other, and
as they continued to fight for their innocence, both of
them credit their own faith as it was taught to
them by their elders, with keeping them strong.
Speaker 3 (35:07):
I follow my traditional native spirituality, so I pray, we
call the Creator, So I do a lot of prayers
in offering tobacco and try I teach my daughters.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
So prayer is powerful.
Speaker 5 (35:19):
That's all we have when you're in prison is prayer.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
And prayer is powerful because I know nobody's greater than
that creator.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
In twenty twenty, more than fifty unmarked graves were discovered
on the grounds of two residential schools near the Keyscus
Reserve for Pelly and Saint Philip's investigation is ongoing into
who those children were, how they died, and how many
more graves are yet to be discovered. Thank you for
(36:22):
listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your
local innocence organizations and go to the links in the
episode description to see how you can help. I'd like
to thank our executive producers Jason Flam, Jeff Kempler, and
Kevin Wortis, as well as senior producer Annie Chelsea, producer
Kathleen Fink, story editor Hannah Beale, and researcher Shelby Sorels.
(36:44):
Mixing and sound design are by Jackie Pauley, with additional
production by Jeff Cliburn and Connor Hall. The music in
this production is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Be sure to follow us on all social media platforms
at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can
also follow me on all platforms at Maggie Freeling Wrongful
(37:05):
Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
Good podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one
On February twenty fifth, nineteen ninety three, police were called
to a house in a remote area in Saskatchewan, Canada.
They arrived to a horrific and bloody scene. Seventy year
old Joseph Dolph was lying face down on his bedroom
floor dead. He had been beaten and stabbed multiple times.
(00:26):
The house was in shambles and there had obviously been
a violent struggle that morning. O'delia and Nerissa Cusance and
their cousin Jason Kashane were picked up by police. The
sisters were held at the station for five days and
questioned repeatedly without counsel.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
These were two young Indigenous women trying to cope with
police officers. White police officers, all male.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
The interrogations were not recorded, and after days of questioning,
both women signed statements admitting to taking part in the killing.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
And on the basis of those unrecorded statements that the
police alleged they gave. After a trial before a jud John,
of course, not surprisingly an all white jury, they were
convicted the following year.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
From LoVa for good this is wrongful conviction with Maggie
Freeling today Odelia and Narissa Cusance o'dellia, Narissa Cusants are
(01:41):
sisters born two years apart and members of the Salto
First Nation. They grew up on the Keiscous Reserve in Saskatchewan, Canada,
along with an older brother and three other sisters.
Speaker 3 (01:54):
And growing up in Kiscous, we all were called the
village kids. We lived in a village.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
This is Odelia, the older of the two, born in
nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
Me and Narissa did not have our mother involved in
our life, but our father was involved in till the
day he passed. He was always there for us.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
I never actually knew my mother, but my dad was.
He was the best thing for me.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
And that's Narissa. The sisters have always been close and
both girls adored their father.
Speaker 5 (02:32):
He was. He's quite a big man. I guess he's
six footy three. He was. He's really into sports.
Speaker 4 (02:37):
He's a hockey player himself, a basketball player, and he
used to be coached.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
On a team on a reserve.
Speaker 4 (02:44):
I mean, we didn't have nothing to eat or no power,
you know, as long as he was there, and that's
that's what mattered to me.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
He did his best. He wasn't perfect. Nobody's perfect.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
Life for the girls growing up was rough, Canada's Indigenous
populations have long faced systemic racism, poverty, violence, and substance
addiction were rampant on the reserve where they lived.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
Seeing people relatives trying to commit suicide, being babysat while
our father trusted someone, and then having a relative commit
suicide shoot himself. And we were little kids getting put
in a pat and you know it's we had a
tough life.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
But the cues On siblings looked out for each other.
Odelia especially tried to protect her younger sisters.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
I love my sisters, and I remember times where we
did go hungry. We always used to tell each other
to stay, you know, be strong, be strong. Sometimes times
it was tough.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
Like generations of family members before them, Odelia and Nourissa
were sent away to residential schools at a very young age, like.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
My dad couldn't raise all of us kids on his own,
And then we were sent to our grandparents and then
to the residential schools. We went to the Bread Boarding School,
and and there's one called Maraval Boarding School that we
went to on Cows's first nation. You know, we were
as saying it was only eight and I don't even know,
I was so young when I went, and all I
(04:28):
remember is loneliness.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
Canada's Indian residential school system, as it was called, was
established in the eighteen seventies with the goal of assimilating
indigenous children into white society. The schools were run by Catholic, Anglican, Methodist,
and Presbyterian churches. For children like Odelia Nourissa, who had
grown up surrounded by extended family and tribal elders on
(04:56):
the reserve, being dropped into a Christian school education system
was total culture shock.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
They take away your esteem, they take away everything because
it's like it's an institution and you know, all a
bunch of young kids that are you know, were just
children being being told to get up at certain time
in the morning, going to church, going doing all this stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
In your kid students were forced to sing and pray
in Latin while their own cultural and spiritual beliefs were
stifled or beaten out of them. For those who didn't conform,
punishment was swift and harsh.
Speaker 3 (05:36):
And I remember though, like one time, wanting to go
to the bathroom and you know, I got put in
the middle of the dorm hat to nail for hours.
You know, as a child, I used to, you know,
like eight seven years old, wanting to wishing to die.
That's terrible. Well who do you turn to, you know?
But we survived it. We survived it.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Many survivors of the resident school system recall being severely
beaten and repeatedly sexually assaulted by supervisors and then nearissa.
Speaker 6 (06:08):
I think I've read that you actually you have like
a spine problem with your back because of what happened
to you at residential school.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Yeah, from trauma. From my body is wasn't quite developed,
so my bones are kind of whatever.
Speaker 6 (06:24):
And that's from being attacked at the school, from being beaten, like.
Speaker 4 (06:30):
Every blows to my body, it wasn't formed or I
guess I remember even as a child, I used to
wonder why God was so mean? Now took a kid.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
The last of these schools was closed in nineteen ninety six,
but not before generations of Indigenous children had been permanently scarred,
both physically and emotionally by their treatment. This arguably contributed
to the system disenfranchisement of Indigenous people in Canada, creating
a highly vulnerable population. How old were y'all when you
(07:20):
left the school and how did you get out of there?
Speaker 3 (07:23):
My mother passed died when I was fourteen, and I
think I don't know how fifteen when I left boarding school.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
Ohdelia dropped out of school and moved to Edmonton to
live with family.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
There.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
She continued to try to look out for her little sister,
but Nourissa was still having a hard time at school,
and she'd been getting into trouble with the law starting
at age thirteen.
Speaker 6 (07:47):
What did you go to prison for the first time?
Speaker 4 (07:50):
First time was I was young. A founder me for
a stolen vehicle and that's where it escalated. There was
nothing violence. I never had any violence on my record
this till my adult charge.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
Her time spent in prison started. Noarissa on the road
to alcohol and hard drugs at a young age.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
I never was introduced that till I went to prison.
Like sure, I used to smoke to odd joints once
in a while, but like take the odd pill. You know,
I became an addict in prison.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
By nineteen ninety three, O'delia was twenty one and Norissa
was eighteen. They had both moved back to the Keyscous
Reserve and were living with their sisters, Orlina and her
husband and kids. Their fifteen year old cousin Jason Kashane,
lived across the road. On the night of February twenty fourth,
nineteen ninety three, Jason stole fifteen tablets of the drug
(08:47):
Restoral from his grandma. He Odelia, and Norissa all took
the sedative, which is used to treat insomnia. It can
cause severe drowsiness and went combined with alcohol periodic back outs.
Later that evening, Jason called an acquaintance, seventy year old
Joseph Dolph, to come and pick them up. Dolf had
(09:09):
worked as a maintenance man at Saint Philip's, one of
the residential schools they had attended. He was known to
regularly invite young Indigenous women and girls to his home.
That night, Dolf wanted to party and they all got
in his car.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
He picked them up, brought them to his fairly remote
home in Comsuck, Saskatchewan if I was very remote, and
provided them with beer and whiskey.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
This is James Lockyer.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
I'm Innocents Canada's Council for the Cuzan's Sisters, Adealer of Nursa.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
With the restaurant already in their systems, the sisters became
more and more inebriated. Later, they would have a hard
time remembering everything that occurred that night. Jason later testified
that Dolf and Odelia left to go get beer. When
they returned, they all continued drinking, finishing off a large
bottle of whiskey Dolf provided, and it seemed he had
(10:06):
an agenda.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
And during the course of the evening, Dolf tried to
persuade Adelia.
Speaker 7 (10:13):
And Nerissa to have sex with him.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
They refused and it led to some dispute between them.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
Around one o'clock in the morning, they persuaded Dolf to
drive them all home, and.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
On the way home, Dolf realized that he had three
hundred dollars missing from his wallet, and he decided to
turn around.
Speaker 7 (10:34):
And go back home.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Back at the house, Dolf accused the three of stealing
the money from him. They denied it, and an argument ensued.
The next day, the police were called to Joseph Dolf's home.
When they entered, they found the place completely trashed, with
furniture turned over and talcum powder sprinkled all around. Dolf's
body was face down in the bedroom. He'd been stabbed
(10:58):
over a dozen times in the chest, abdomen, back and
left arm, a knife was still in his stomach and
a phone cord was wrapped around his neck. There were
blunt force injuries on his head and a fracture near
his right eye. When the police started asking around the
community about who could have been involved.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
They quickly ascertained that the two Cusant's sisters and Jason
had been at his house that night.
Speaker 7 (11:25):
They were all three arrested.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
That morning. O'delia, Narissa, and Jason were taken to the
Kamsack Police Detachment by the RCMP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
The sisters were stripped to their underwear and placed in
concrete cells with only raincoats to wear. Later, they were
given sweatpants and sweatshirts. Both women spoke with lawyers who
(11:52):
told the police that their clients were not to be questioned.
The next day, the Justice of the Peace ordered that
the cis be remanded to the nearest jail. This was Friday.
Speaker 2 (12:04):
However, the police ignored that order and kept them until
the following Tuesday in the police detachment, so that they
were a matter of eight steps from numerous all white,
all male police officers in the Camsack detachment in Canada,
If you want to hold someone for more than twenty
(12:25):
four hours in police custody you have to get judicial authorization.
And they were held in the cells there for a
total of five nights. And on these most unpleasant cells
which I've seen, they have a seventeenth century appearance to them.
Very thick white concrete walls, probably twelve to fifteen inches thick,
(12:48):
with bars going from ceiling to ground, and you know,
hard cold steel bunks with no bedding, so you know,
a very its very nature, highly intimidating for both of them.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Meanwhile, their cousin, Jason, was also being questioned, and on
the very first day.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
Jason confessed to the homicide, and his confession was recorded
on tape, a tape recording that somehow was not available.
When it came to the questioning of Nourissa and Adelia
to being the one who did the stabbings.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
The sisters were told that Jason had confessed to the
murder and that he implicated them as well, which was
later found not to be true. The two were questioned
repeatedly by the RCMP over the next four days.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
They have memory being extremely scared, of course, and frightened
around all these men. These what to them were big
burly white men, continually bringing them out of the cells
and questioning them again, and putting them back in and
questioning them again.
Speaker 7 (13:53):
Over day after day. They had no lawyers, and.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
The police knew what they wanted, They knew what they
were doing.
Speaker 7 (14:03):
They had to.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
Get these two girls to say things that somehow tied
them into mister Dolph's murder. The police alleged that they
gave verbal statements not recorded that slowly but surely amounted
to more incriminating statements. So as I say, they got
ad Elier to admit one stab wound out of more
(14:24):
than forty, how did they get.
Speaker 6 (14:26):
The girls to confess to this?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
There's no doubt there was intimidating taxics used. These were
two young Indigenous women trying to cope with police officers,
white police officers.
Speaker 7 (14:39):
All male.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
More than that, they were both victims of the residential
school system. They were highly vulnerable individuals. Well never really
know exactly what happened because none of it was recorded,
they had no lawyers. It was made clearer than what
they wanted to hear. The policeman wrote out what they
claimed the girls were saying. One of Nourissa's statements was
(15:04):
clearly not her words, and on the basis of those
unrecorded statements that the police alleged they gave. They were
convicted the following year after a trial before a jud Johann,
of course, not surprisingly an all white jury.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling.
You can listen to this and all the Lover for
Good podcasts one week early and ad free by subscribing
to LoVa for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
Adelia and Nourissa testified at their trials. The trouble is
that they had it made clear to them that it
was not in their interest to try and challenge the
versions of events given by the RCMP officers in front
of the jury, because if they did, they'd be disbelieved.
Speaker 1 (16:20):
After the years they'd spent at residential schools, the girls
were conditioned to succumb to authority and believed no one
would help them.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
They were told to stay in line as to how
they were treated by the police, who of course testified
that they treated them well, etc. Etc. For those five days,
even though they shouldn't have been in the police station
for four of them, and no one really seemed to
see much wrong.
Speaker 7 (16:44):
Without a trial. Certainly the trial judge didn't.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
Her name was Justice Gunn was her name. So they
tried to fall into step, you might say, with what
the RCMP officers said. Not entirely, but they did their
best to so that they're claim that they had not
been involved in mister Dolph's murder will be more likely believed.
And this was classic for those times that Indigenous people
(17:10):
were told by their own lawyers that you know, if
it's your word against the police, no one's going to
believe you.
Speaker 6 (17:20):
So for people in the US who don't know about
the systemic abuses of Indigenous people in Canada, can you
describe that a little bit?
Speaker 7 (17:29):
Well, it's not unlike your country.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's very much a colonial history where we colonize the
original peoples of our part of the continent, and you
did the same in your part of the continent. The
RCMP has in the past and still to this day,
engages in systemic racism towards Indigenous peoples. That's acknowledged publicly,
i might say, with some reluctance, but nevertheless acknowledged. The
(17:54):
case of Adelia and Urus are just smacks of this.
Here we have two young girls, both indigenous. I mean
if you or I had been the ones arrested in
February of nineteen ninety three, they wouldn't have held us
in the police cells for five days in complete violation
of a judicial order.
Speaker 7 (18:14):
They're victims of.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
Systemic discrimination, and it obviously includes within it then the
failure of the police to make any attempt to record
any of the interviews, despite the fact that the recording
equipment was right there in the police station. Their failure
to obey a judicial order for day after day after day,
their failure to in any way document the conditions of
(18:40):
both a dealer and Urissa, that their level of intoxication
on arrest, their level of drug taking, and overall the
fact that it's become known in the last twenty years
that false confessions are a regular feature of wrongful convictions,
and false confession above all come from those who are
(19:03):
vulnerable in the first place.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Okay, So going back to the trial, o'delia and Narisso
were tried in the Court of Queen's Benson, Yorkton before
Madame Justice Ellen Gunn, And as you said earlier, it
was an all white jury, and we've heard how the
sisters were basically forced to incriminate themselves at trial, But
what did their lawyers present in defense.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
Their defense was that the two women were both drunk
at the time and therefore their responsibility meant they should
only be convicted of manslaughter. It was like a sort
of a semi surrender defense.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
So they didn't bring up a foss confession.
Speaker 7 (19:44):
No, they did not.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Jason was called by the Crown as a witness, and
indeed when he testified at trial, he implicated himself and
said that he was the one who had stabbed mister Doff.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
At trial, Jason told a more complete story of what
happened that night. Jason said, once they all returned to
the house, Joseph Dolph went looking for his missing money.
They all got into an altercation and Narissa hit Dolf
on the head with a porcelain ornament, which broke in
a tea kettle. O'dela hit him with a whiskey bottle.
(20:21):
Jason punched Dolf, who was going after Narissa, then followed
him into the bedroom and choked him with a telephone cord.
Then he grabbed a knife from the kitchen and stabbed
Dolf repeatedly, finally leaving the knife in his body. He
said o'delia and Nourissa were in another room together crying.
After Jason finished assaulting Dolf, the three trashed the house.
(20:45):
Then Jason took Dolph's keys and drove them all home.
It would later come out that Jason was told to
implicate o'dela Noarissa by saying they had hit Dolf. According
to Jason, they actually hadn't. He had been the sole attacker. However,
Jason's testimony did corroborate the sister's assertion that they were
(21:08):
not the ones who had killed Joseph Dolph. He was.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
He'd already pleaded guilty to the crime. He was a
fifteen year old, so he pleaded guilty under the Young
Offender's Act and received a sentence of five years. So
the real killer was in for five years, and at
his age, he shouldn't.
Speaker 7 (21:27):
Have been in for longer than that. I would hasten
to add.
Speaker 6 (21:32):
Was he asked directly if the girls did and did
he say no or was he just not yes?
Speaker 5 (21:36):
Okay?
Speaker 1 (21:36):
And he said no, they did not.
Speaker 7 (21:37):
Yes, he said he's the win who stabbed them.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Wow.
Speaker 6 (21:41):
So even though they were not implicated at the trial
by him, they're still convicted. Yes, On February fourth, nineteen
(22:07):
ninety four, Odelia and Narissa were convicted of second degree
murder and sentenced to life in prison with the possibility
of parole in ten years. While she was incarcerated, Odela
stayed connected with her partner, Jay, whom she'd known since
she was eighteen. In two thousand and one, she gave
birth to their daughter and six years later twin girls.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
My oldest daughter, Hayley, she lived in prison for two
years with me.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
What was that like living with your daughter in prison?
Speaker 3 (22:48):
I was just grateful she was there with me.
Speaker 8 (22:50):
Yes, it was like, you know, but do you know
what my daughter today, she's very outspoken, and she had
a lot of Auntie and Cook Coombs in there to
take care of her, you know, like she was allowed
to be a child in there.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
Were there other were there other women with kids?
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Yeah? Wow?
Speaker 6 (23:12):
And so once your daughters, you know, left prison and
were older, who were they living with And what was
that like to try and parent from behind bars?
Speaker 3 (23:21):
My daughters they were living with their father and he
took care of them, and he brought them to visit
me and read a couple months. I talked on a
phone with them a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
How do you do being a dad?
Speaker 3 (23:34):
I think he did pretty good. Kind of spoiled their girls,
but in a good way though.
Speaker 1 (23:46):
While in prison, Odelia also earned her ged, completed a
number of programs, and worked in the library, horticulture, kitchen,
and daycare. She grew to be respected as a leader
by both prisoners and staff. Norissa earned a degree in
adult education from the University of Saskatoon while at the
(24:06):
Edmonton Institution for Women, the first incarcerated person to graduate
from the university and attend her own convocation. She also
earned a degree in animal welfare and worked as a
dog trainer. Nearly ten years into their sentence, the sisters
hit a milestone, so.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
As of February twenty fourth, two thousand and three, they
were eligible for Pearl.
Speaker 7 (24:33):
They didn't get it, and when they did.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
Release them a couple of times they imposed these onerous
conditions on them, which not surprisingly, they violated. So in
twenty twenty, above the time David Milgard came to me,
they both served more than they were actually by then.
That's served twenty eight years of their sentences.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
In James, can you explain who David Milgard is and
how he became involved in this case.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
David was a person who had spent twenty three years
in prison in Canada for a great murder he did
not commit, and ever since his exoneration, continued to advocate
for the wrongly convicted and Nourissa and Adelia Cusance approached
him in I think in the summer of twenty twenty,
and David then asked me if I would take on
(25:23):
their case?
Speaker 1 (25:24):
So, why did you believe in their innocence? What convinced
you of that?
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Taking into account the whole systemic racism involved in this,
it wasn't a hard one. Once I had a chance
to read the trial transcripts, the case to me stank
When I saw that they had been held in custody
in the police station for five days. That in itself
did it for me. I'd never heard of such a thing, never.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
And so what was your strategy for getting them out?
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Adelia and Nurissa had had their appeals dismissed in nineteen
ninety five, a year after their convictions. Paragraph judgment of
the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, which kind of shows you
how much attention was given to their case. The only
method of challenging a conviction in Canada after all appeal
processes have been exhausted, and after their appeals have been lost,
(26:17):
their only avenue of recourse was to go to the
Minister of Justice, who's in our capital city in Ottawa,
and ask him to review their convictions and determine whether
they constituted the mis charriage of justice.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
So you did that in twenty twenty two, and then
what did you present to the minister.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
We gave a whole list of reasons as to why
these convictions constitutedious charriage of justice. We pointed out that
Canada's treatment of Indigenous peoples and this case was a
classic abuse of Indigenous peoples, especially women. We talked about
the impacts of systemic discrimination on the two of them
(26:59):
in the investigation.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
And so to this day, does Jason still maintain that
o'dellia and Nerissa were not involved.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
Yes, I've met Jason a couple of times. Of course,
he's now in his mid forties. He's had a pretty
difficult life since and bears besides the guilt of stabbing
mister Dolph, for the guilt of having implicated Nurisa and
Adelia by what he did. But yes, he maintains they
(27:30):
had nothing to do with it, and his statement to
that effect, which he put in writing, enabled us to
bring a release application for them until the Minister made
his final decision.
Speaker 7 (27:42):
And I'm glad to say that on March.
Speaker 2 (27:45):
Twenty seventh of twenty twenty three, more than thirty years
after their original arrests and imprisonment, they were released on
bail and they're both presently on bail.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
The situation these two women found themselves in is unfortunately
not unusual. According to Canada's Office of the Congressional Investigator,
over fifty percent of incarcerated women in Canada are Indigenous.
Indigenous people are historically more likely to be arrested for
serious crimes, are rarely tried by their peers, and are
(28:23):
more likely to be convicted. And like at the residential
schools where they were first institutionalized, Indigenous people continue to
face systemic racism and abuse throughout the prison and parole system.
Speaker 6 (28:42):
Does the law in Canada seem to be more understanding
now of the plight of Indigenous folks and what they
have gone through and suffered, you know, particularly like o'dellia
Narissa winding up in a situation like this because of
the systemic abuse.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
To some extent, the answer is yes. Having said that,
we have a huge problem in Canada because the Indigenous
percentages in the prisons are going up and up and
up year by year by year. The denials of parole
for the Indigenous are going up and up and up.
(29:21):
The number of Indigenous being found to be dangerous offenders
and subject to life sentences are going up and up
and up. So whilst there may be more recognition, particularly
with the present government that talks a great deal about
the need for truth and reconciliation with our Indigenous people,
at the criminal justice level, things are just terribly.
Speaker 5 (29:43):
Wrong, right.
Speaker 6 (29:44):
You know, parole here is pretty awful as well. How
is it in Canada? Why is it so bad if
you're Indigenous?
Speaker 7 (29:51):
Because they don't release you.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
That's the SATs.
Speaker 7 (29:53):
I mean, there are many reasons for this, but.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
A very simple part of a systemic discrimination is they
have ah whole system whereby they assess what they call
the criminogenic factors of the individual, the likelihood that they
will re offend if released, and the assessments are conducted
according to the thinking and customs of the white man,
(30:17):
not the thinking, customs and cultures of the Indigenous, and
It's been proved very clearly that that means that the
Indigenous are always overassessed in terms of the likelihood of
their reoffending, which automatically is then used to justify denying
them parole. And then when they do release you, they
(30:38):
release you on conditions that are almost bound to be violated.
No alcohol, no drugs, curfews, those kinds of things which
people who are Indigenous likely not very stable, don't have
stable environments to return to, are going to be living
potentially on reserves, almost bound to violate drinking, and you're
(31:01):
on a life sentence. You're back in two three years
before you're next entitled to even be considered for parole.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Even though Odelia and Narissa were released in March, they
have not been exonerated of Joseph Dolf's murder. They're still
living under parole conditions while they await ministerial review, hoping
for the decision that would finally allow them to live
fully free.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
For me and my sister at this time, like I know,
all I have is to wait and is waked and wait.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Odelia is now back at home with Jay and their
twin daughters. Nourissa is living with a good friend an
advocate Kim Bowden and his wife Rhonda.
Speaker 4 (31:44):
He's the Congress of Amagual People of Canada Vice president
and yeah, he's myself is I just love him and Rohnda. No,
he's a great man and I usually have a hard
time trusting man.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
After nearly three decades in prison, both sisters, now fifty
one and forty nine, are doing their best to adjust
to life outside of prison walls while on parole.
Speaker 4 (32:18):
But for myself, it's a real It's different because I'm
so institutionalized that I'm used to everything coming. Like if
I had to go see the doctor, I just had
to go across across the road and or go get
groceries just across the hallway. Maybe so, and now here
it's it's hard to do. I kind of I've only
ridden on a bus once since I've been out here.
(32:40):
I have really bad anxiety, and I noticed that I
get really irritable and stuff like that, so I don't
really like being around people.
Speaker 6 (32:47):
I understand that you were You were in a prison
with a lot of people for a long time.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
How about you, Adelia, what kinds of things that you're
a mom? What's that like?
Speaker 3 (32:56):
It's been a challenge because I've been away from them
for so much many years. So it's rekindling with my
daughters and getting to know them. And you know, there's
there's a lot of resentments, you know, and I feel
them like I we have a good relationship, like I
try to be my best, fights my girls and you know,
give them what they want. But it's hard.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
It's hard to.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Be honest, you know what. I feel useless. Sometimes I
feel like I, you know, so went down institutionalize.
Speaker 9 (33:28):
I don't know what to do on my own. Sometimes
I want to do things, make things different. I'm still
hopeful about, you know, my future. But like I said,
it's it's hard.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
It's a struggle when you just yeah, like great, now
I'm starting to get getting getting out of my bedroom
as I'm so used to being in a room.
Speaker 5 (33:49):
Yeah, that's what I do too. I spend a lot
of room time. I do a lot of sell time. Still.
Speaker 6 (33:55):
Yeah, yeah, I understand that. I hear that from a
lot of people who have been inside. It's it's it's scary.
Speaker 7 (34:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:02):
I always tell myself you're okay, you're safe. Now, You're okay,
it's going to be okay. I always tell myself that
my younger solf.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Of Delia and Narissa have found strength in going to conferences,
meeting other Axonna reeves and telling their story.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
I want to help people and I want to be
an advocate for women and children.
Speaker 5 (34:27):
I remember when I was younger, when I was in jail,
Like even before I went to BC, I used to say,
one day, I'm.
Speaker 4 (34:33):
Going to climb that mountain, you know, And that's what
it meant for me. It is like, you know, one
day I'm going to get there to the top, you know.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
So where is the top of that mountain for you?
Speaker 4 (34:45):
Well, I'm there already.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
Just as they did when they were children, the Q
Zone sisters are still looking out for each other, and
as they continued to fight for their innocence, both of
them credit their own faith as it was taught to
them by their elders, with keeping them strong.
Speaker 3 (35:07):
I follow my traditional native spirituality, so I pray, we
call the Creator, So I do a lot of prayers
in offering tobacco and try I teach my daughters.
Speaker 4 (35:17):
So prayer is powerful.
Speaker 5 (35:19):
That's all we have when you're in prison is prayer.
Speaker 3 (35:25):
And prayer is powerful because I know nobody's greater than
that creator.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
In twenty twenty, more than fifty unmarked graves were discovered
on the grounds of two residential schools near the Keyscus
Reserve for Pelly and Saint Philip's investigation is ongoing into
who those children were, how they died, and how many
more graves are yet to be discovered. Thank you for
(36:22):
listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your
local innocence organizations and go to the links in the
episode description to see how you can help. I'd like
to thank our executive producers Jason Flam, Jeff Kempler, and
Kevin Wortis, as well as senior producer Annie Chelsea, producer
Kathleen Fink, story editor Hannah Beale, and researcher Shelby Sorels.
(36:44):
Mixing and sound design are by Jackie Pauley, with additional
production by Jeff Cliburn and Connor Hall. The music in
this production is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Be sure to follow us on all social media platforms
at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can
also follow me on all platforms at Maggie Freeling Wrongful
(37:05):
Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
Good podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
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