Edmonton Journal from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada • 7

EDITOR: Dick MacLean. 429-5290 THE EDMONTON JOURNAL, BRUNCH, SUNDAY, JUNE 9, 1985 Where Jeffrey Duapres? 2 4., 'III I i i lit i By SHEILA KOHN (Special to Brunch) If you're a parent, you've done it. We've all done it. You can create a new life but you can't give a hundred per cent guarantee. You go to the bathroom, throw in the laundry, answer the phone, sneak a look at the soaps.

Your child is screaming at the door and the baby starts to cry. "Stay in the yard while I get your sister dressed or it's "Mom, let me look in the toys while you shop How many times in a department store do we hear: "If anyone has lost a little boy with green pants and a brown jacket, would they please come to customer service?" Ill Ilk 1 4 sit 5 1 l- i 5 F- A 66 There was nothing unusual about the morning of April 24, 1980. 99 PICTURE: Keith McNichol Members of the Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry search the bush for three-year-old Jeffrey Dupres, who disappeared from his Slave Lake home April 24, 1980 street, looking for Jeffrey's dark curls. It seemed a little odd that Jeffrey wasn't one of them, he was too sociable to pass playing kids. Jeffrey Dupres (below), a happy, sociable three-year-old, was the centre of his parents' lives; Denise and Ray Dupres (right) pose for a family portrait with their second son, Christopher, born 3'2 years after Jeffrey disappeared.

66 I think someone has taken my son. 99 frantic enough to convince them she needed help. Another call and Ray was on his way home. Regional council in Slave Lake shut down the office and the employees headed for the Dupres home. The RCMP officer advised Denise to call the manager of the Canada Employment Centre to organize a search.

Word spread and more and more people began to show up at the Dupres home. A women in high heels showed up at the door saying she was there to look for a missing kid. She wasn't even aware it was Denise's door she'd knocked on. Denise lent her boots and jeans. Jeffrey had now been missing for four hours, and the first of hundreds of volunteers began going door-to-door in the light drizzle, telling people of the boy's disappearance.

At 11:45 p.m., civilian search coordinators moved their base to the Canada Employment Centre and shortly after midnight an RCMP tracking dog arrived from Fort Saskatchewan. Dog and master searched for three hours, but no scent could be picked up due to the heavy fog and rain. It's so easy. And then what could never happen to us, happens. Your child is missing.

Gone. Disappeared into thin air, the stuff horror movies are made of, where there are no hugs, no cookie reunions, no washing scared tears away. There is just the sheer terror, the heart-in-your-throat panic and overwhelming guilt. For those of us whose children are safely at home, it's not hard to place some of the blame on the parents: "That wouldn't happen to me, to my child, those parents must have done something wrong But that's not the reality. The reality, the stark, hateful truth stares at us frm the 'missing' posters, faces us each day on the national news.

The truth is that there are people in this world who prey on children, children in Edmonton shopping malls, children like Tania Murrell, children like Jeffrey Dupres. There was nothing unusual about the morning of April 24, 1980 in the Slave Lake home of Ray and Denise Dupres. Their three-year-old son Jeffrey with his built-in alarm clock, coaxed his parents out of bed. The air was hazy and news on the radio reported a fresh forest fire on the west side of Slave Lake, while updating listeners to the current condition of the two-day-old fire on the east side of town. The smell of coffee and Jeffrey's morning chatter were the norm.

The Dupres were a new family to Slave Lake, still settling in after three months. A young family, with their first child, a wanted and planned child. Denise chose to stay home, a full-time mum. Ray was employed by Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council and today he would be working in the High Prairie office. Outside of those he had met in Regional Council, Ray and Denise hadn't yet had time to form friendships in their new community.

"We were having fun and life was meaningful to us," says Denise. "Like Denise interupted the busy play to ask a couple of kids where Jeffrey was, she asked a mother out checking her own child if she had seen Jeffrey. No one had seen him. She then took the family pickup and drove along neighboring streets. Where was Jeffrey? "WHERE IS JEFFREY?" The words were screaming in Denises's head.

Her eyes strained, driving became secondary. She could feel her stomach starting to churn and a whispered prayer came from deep inside, "Oh God, let me find him." And in the High Prairie office of regional council, Ray Dupres leaned back, loosened his tie and joked with his co-worker. He had no reason to turn his thoughts on his home, his wife or his son. Denise drove down one more street before heading home. The house was quiet.

She dialed the Slave Lake RCMP. It was now a quarter to two, and for the first time she voiced her fear: "I think someone has taken my son. The RCMP were busy with a spreading forest fire on the west side of town. Denise was advised to ask the neighbors for help. A 15-year-old boy combed the brush behind her house and four women started to search the yards along the street.

Denise took Rodney in the truck to re-check the neighborhood. By 2:20, she was desperate. Another call to the Slave Lake RCMP, this time 66 Oh God, let me find him. Denise spent the morning doing her usual routine chores. Sounds of her son and his friend playing filtered in through the open window.

Then came lunch time: this time Jeffrey's friend would be the first to call on him. And back outside around 1 p.m. went the two of them. Denise heard Rodney's dad call his son back to get his face washed. When Denise glanced through the kitchen window a few minutes later, she didn't think anything of not seeing Jeffrey.

She assumed Jeffrey had tagged along with his friend; bathroom habits of little boys were unpredictable. A few minutes later, Rodney came again to the Dupres door, this time with a clean face. Denise was a little surprised to hear him ask for Jeffrey. "Let's look in the front yard, Rodney." Jeffrey's tricycle was parked on the front lawn, and where his tricyle was, he couldn't be far away. Denise quickly scanned other tots playing on the quiet any other parents, Ray and I believed Jeffrey was an extraordinary child.

We took him everywhere. Like other new parents, we resented invitations which did not include him. We narrowed our relationships so Jeffrey would fit in. We settled into a pattern of existence which had Ray and I in Jeffrey's orbit. We were just a normal family." Three-year-olds are sociable and already Jeffrey had a best friend next door.

They played at each other's homes, got muddy together and raced their tricycles up and down the sidewalk. And like good true buddies, the race was on to see who could ring the other's doorbell first. It was now past midnight. For the past three years, little Jeffrey has long been tucked in and fast asleep by this time. It's been a time for mum and dad to relax together, and to count their blessings.

Not tonight. The day of April 24, 1980 is over for Ray and Denise, the longest day of their lives. The Search continues B2 pick MacLean SOMETIMES, AFTER A FEW HOURS hot-dogging 'round town, Real Columnists hide in lounges. Sometimes, on a hazy afternoon you can see the actual columnist's dozy carcass slumped in a corner of the bar. There he is, clinging to a fragile sense of reality, looking for items for the column.

Should no items ap-pear, he simply makes -A vv V4 them up. Real Columnists, in their secret lunacy, gaze fondly at the gossamer blouses of the server person. Having, without cover charge, fantasies involving the amaryllis with the Amaretto. Finding items is about as simple as performing a vasectomy with a sexes, from swarming all over your rent-a-den. And if people knew where you hung out, then fellas like Glen Sather, Rubin Stahl, Peter Elzinga, Rob Dingman, George Gillespie, Alcide Marchesich, Dave Lumley, Prince Roger Nelson and Barry Tomalty would make pesky phone calls, complaining that either their name was in Brunch or was not in.

Or, in Brimacombe's case, offering to buy lunch but never buying lunch. So the other day, around Happy Hour, there was this scribbler, gnawing on deep-fried gerbils or some such unidentified frying object, when just like that he picked up som; items. Here they are. DOWNTOWN 'N OUTS Ex-Ombudsman Dr. Randall Ivany's former aide-de-camp, Alberta Power Flack Bob Wyatt devoted hours to celebrating his 33rd birfday in Giovanni Marchesi's Mama Teresa Restaurant.

Ken Heffel, Vancouver art dealer and companion of Edmonton's vivacious Hazel Hett guessed Wyatt to be 45 years of age. Thus friends are lost. Two rude women, were loudly "shushed" for babbling and cackling like hens in heat while Giovanni was bellowing some Italian song of lust Yes, sharp eyes, that was Mrs. Lou Hyndman, wife of the Provincial Treasurer, stalled and out of gas in the West End. Seems the Pontiac petrol gauge doesn't work Paleontologists in Arizona have discovered the fossil remains of dinosaur bones 225 million years next month It's probably not excruciatingly important but you should know, Father's Day and all, that Giorgio, Beverly Hills is the best selling fragrance at Holt Renfrew.

Real Alberta men buying a fragrance? THERE'S BUBBLE TROUBLE in Epernay, France. This year's French champagne grape harvest seems likely to be one of the worst in about 50 years on account of severe winter and spring frosts. But because it takes three years for the bubbly wine to reach the shelves there are ample stocks after bumper harvests in the early '80s, so there's no need to get hysterical or cut down. A MERE JOTTER OF ITEMS (jot, jot, jot) Usually confused sources say the RCMP is ready to abandon the 10 Most Wanted poster list. "The whole area of 10 Most Wanted is under review" said Deep Goat, on the horn from Ottawa.

"We are looking at other alternatives, perhaps something like Crime Stoppers; producing video cassettes and zeroing in on one individual. Splashing it all over." DICKEY BIRD'S ALMANAC Overheard in Swallows Restaurant: "Wasn't it Suzy Sutton, who said 'Marriage has its good side. It teaches you loyalty, forbearance, self-restraint and many other qualities you wouldn't need if you stayed old could they be Julian Kiniski in a previous life? A Day Care prosauropod? ALONG THE TRTVIERA Is is possible ex-Edmonton high-roller restaurateur Myron Holubitsky and his Smoky Lake June bride are moving to Costa Rica to buy an orange grove? Is the Pope moving to a grouse preserve in Scotland? Nellie and Tom White's Tea House Chef Floyd Pester is parked in a wheelchair these days after he snapped his right ankle at his lake cottage. Does anyone believe that story? Tom, who's handy with the paint brush and has been touching up his cafe, still thinks Terra Cotta is fear of beds. GOOD THINGS FOR GOOD PEOPLE Single city singer Susan Whalen has been awarded a $500 achievement scholarship by the Cosmopolitan Club to further her music studies.

The award was in recognition of Susan's artistic growth and development over a period, of two years with Dasha Goody's Edmonton Musical (nee Orion) Theatre. Tommy Banks made the presentation at the cast party following the four-day run of EMTs Pieces of Dreams at the Citadel. CREDIT WHERE CREDIT IS DUE Barry Steams has wrapped up a 21 -year career with the Edmonton Credit Bureau. Marg Bauer is holding the fort until Stearns's replacement, Al Wright, from the Fraser Valley takes over as GM early MacLean chainsaw. Real Columnists operate on the coarse theory that it's not what you know or who you know, but what you know about who you know.

It's hard to find items of skimpy fiction and trashy glamor in a town with a whiff of Nebraska. Real Columnists never print the names of their favorite hangouts. This prevents 4x4 louts, hockey lumps like Dave Semenko; lawyers like Jim Brimacombe and Bob Duke or groupies, of all i.