My name is Brenda Osborne. I'm here on behalf of my daughter who has been missing for the last five years. Her name is Claudette Osborne. I have numbers on who was murdered. Too many, I guess I could say. I don't know whether any of you sitting with us together today have daughters who have been missing or murdered.
Helen Betty Osborne was murdered at the park or in the school. My uncle was shot by a woman who never went to jail. My cousin was murdered. The guy did five years. Felicia Osborne went missing going to school in Winnipeg trying to be a teacher to try to help young people because she loved kids. She went missing going home for lunch. She never made it home. Six months later we found her leg and her arm. That's all we found and buried.
My daughter's missing, and we don't have any answers. We don't have any leads or tips at all. I try to go out and do my own investigations. I go late at night. I ask questions about who she knew out there. The police stopped me from doing it because they told me I was going to be charged for prostituting the girls because I was feeding them something because some of those girls are on the street. They are hungry, so that's what I did. I made sandwiches and I brought juice for them just to have that gift. At the same time I was asking questions about my daughter, who she knew, and the police told me I was going to be charged for prostituting the girls out there. They chased me away. I couldn't do it anymore because I didn't want to get thrown in jail for that.
I'd rather do something else. We do vigils and have gatherings. We get together with other families and support each other because there is no support for our family.
Every year I do a walk from Norway House to Winnipeg. A couple of years ago I was here in this same room. Two years ago I walked from Norway House to Winnipeg, and from Winnipeg to Ottawa here. That time they told us what kind of help they could offer us. We're still waiting for that help. There is nothing.
There are families like the Nepinaks. They are suffering with their loss because they don't know whether her sister has been....She's one of the ladies we get together with once a week just to hang on to each other. The only thing we have in life.... For myself, I only have hope. That's all I have because I can't say my daughter was murdered. I don't know.
Today I'm honoured to be here because I wanted to state that we need to be heard, and we need help. We do these walks every year. It doesn't matter who it is. We do it for all missing and murdered. I guess that's my life. I dedicate that to them every day. It didn't matter how hot it was; it didn't matter if it was raining. We walked all day long, sixteen hours a day. Who's going to do that for us? Nobody.
We come here today for her. It seems like the murderers get away with murder. Roberta McIvor was murdered, and the girl only did two years.
This guy who's going to jail now supposedly killed two women, but see, what I didn't understand is that they never brought up that one woman was pregnant. This guy was given 20 years. He did two years and he's going to get out in eight. Is that fair for us? We're the ones suffering every day, and he's going to get out.
The justice system has to change.
We live with this pain every day. We carry our hurt and suffering with other people, and nobody is there.... I get mad when somebody says, “How are you today?” How am I supposed to feel? I can't say, “I'm good.”
The murderers are getting away with murder and they laugh about it. You kill somebody.... You drag somebody out from their car, you cut their throat first, you drag them out, and then you run them over, and you call that an accident? That's no accident. That's murder, and she was in jail for two years for that.
I don't wish that.... You go for trial for murder, you know...judges and the police making deals. What about the families, the ones who suffer? They're the ones suffering today. We're the ones suffering today. We carry that every day. We go to bed with it at night, and we get up with it in the morning.
Thank you very much for listening.