The Vancouver Sun from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada • 9

9 The Vancouver Sun, Saturday, March 24, 1990 BRITISH COLUMBIA WEEKEND EXTRA THE BIZARRE LIFE AND MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF CINDY JAMES WV ,.0 Tl 0 PARING KNIFE: Jammed through back of James' hand JL if rtVlkw Vancouver Sun crime reporter Neal Hall has been covering the Cindy James inquest for the past three weeks and provides this overview of testimony in an inquest that is destined tq become the most expensive, and possibly longest, in B.C. history. read 'Now you must die' IT IS A remarkable tale with the stark horror of a Stephen King novel, the bloody violence of a Brian DePalma film and the psychological twists of an Alfred Hitchcock thriller. At one point during the inquest into the death of Cindy James, a tape recording was played in coroner's court of a disguised voice that hissed in a slow, menacing whisper: "Cindy dead meat soooooon." It sounded terrifying, like something from The Exorcist. But was it what it seemed? The inquest, which has heard three weeks of testimony and resumes Tuesday, is trying to determine if James was really the tortured prey of a sadistic night stalker.

Her family and some of her closest friends think she was. Her parents feel police failed to protect their bright and beautiful daughter. The alternative theory, offered by forensic psychiatrist Dr. Anthony Marcus, is that James cast herself as the victim in a fantastic plot of her own creation. "She was in a living nightmare," he said, suggesting she may have suffered bouts of amnesia after some of the 90 incidents police investigated.

HE BODY of the 44-year-old nurse, bound hand and foot, was found last June 8 in the bushes behind an abandoned Richmond house. The word "DEVIL" was spray-painted on the crumbling plaster of an inside wall of the house. Ozzie Kaban, a private investigator hired by James in 1983, thought she was the victim of a warped mind practising voodoo or satanic rites. Police originally investigated her death as a homicide but later ruled out foul play, which suggests James died by her own hand by accident or by committing suicide. Toxicology tests conducted after her death showed the presence of morphine in her body more than 10 times a lethal dose.

How could she have had enough time to administer the drug, leave no evidence of a syringe or drug container, and tie her hands and feet? Was an accomplice involved in her death plot? Did James strangle the dead cats found in her yard on four occasions? Her family says she loved animals and would catch a fly in her home and take it outside rather than kill it. The inquest jurors a bus driver, a retired furnace repair noticed something in the man's hand and he hit her on the head. OLLOWING the incident, James took another lie-detector test that indicated she was telling the truth. But RCMP S. Sgt.

Cal Hood, who administered the polygraph, said he reviewed the test results shortly before the inquest and decided they were inconclusive. After another incident on July 23, 1984, in which James said she was attacked while walking her dog at Dunbar Park, she told a a hypnotherapist a chilling tale of witnessing her ex-husband chopping up the bodies of a man and woman with an axe at a log cabin somewhere in the Gulf Islands during a 1981 boating trip. On July 2, 1985, police tape-recorded a phone call James made to Makepeace to confront him with her memories under hypnosis. He denied during the call he was the source of her "problems" and he suggested she was either insane or was involved in an "enormous" revenge fantasy. After the call, police launched 24-hour surveillance of Makepeace, James and two other suspects, who weren't named.

The seven-day operation, which utilized up to 14 officers, was terminated when nothing happened. Dr. Marcus was contacted by Vancouver police in the fall of 1985 for his opinion. He read summary reports of the police file and interviewed James twice. DESCRIBED James as a "borderline personality someone who is between neurosis and reality." That condition, he said, might have resulted from an incident, perhaps a sexual assault, during early childhood or adolescence periods he never interviewed her about.

r.r Marcus said the patient would be walking "a tightrope on the side of life" and might kill herself by. Lwt: Police investigated a very similar case in Witchita, Kansas, where a woman complained of a series of attacks and threatening notes from an unknown assailant between 1977 and 1981. A piece of a red bandana was found at the scene of the alleged rW-'fii When caught in the act of sendirig herself a threatening letters the woman said she had been molested by a neighbor when she was 3'i and the man had stuffed a red bandana down her throat to stifle her cries. The calling card in James' case was a black nylon stocking. She was found on four separate occasions with a stocking tied tightly around her neck.

Marcus said he couldn't rule out an unknown assailant or that an accomplice may have been involved. But there was one thing he was certain about: James' terror was very real. "This woman was under siege from whatever source inside or out." QUOTES OF THE WEEK "I'd like to draw political cartoons for the paper 'coz you need only one good idea a day. Then I thought about it and decided it would be easier to be a sports-writer 'coz you don't need to have any." Sam Snead on being asked what he'd be doing if he weren't playing golf. "I would rather be in Mecca, praying." Saudia arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, a co-defendant in the Imelda Marcos fraud, conspiracy and racketeering trial.

"I'm not going to conform to his rah, rah follow me over the cliff type of attitude. I think you've got to have that attitude to some degree, but this is the 1990s, not the 1950s." Matt Dunigan on B.C. Lions President and General Manager Joe Kapp after Dunigan was traded to the Toronto Argos. "I'm really very fed up with the ridiculous claims of some of the environmentalists They amount to a kind of verbal flashing." Adam Zimmerman, chairman of Noranda Forest at the Globe '90 conference. "I'm relieved.

I've had better years." Former Exxon Valdez Captain Joseph Hazelwood after being found not guilty on three of four charges relating to an oil spill in Alaska. jNDP's green caucus vows to push preservationist line THREATENING LETTERS: company owner, a housewife, a shop owner and a property manager have the daunting task of trying to unravel the bizarre life and mysterious death of Cindy James. HE INQUEST was originally scheduled for three weeks but it is progressing much slower than expected. Twenty more days have been added, meaning it will continue into May. James was born Cynthia Elizabeth Hack on June 12, 1944.

Her father, Otto Hack, was an air force colonel, now retired; her mother, Matilda, a housewife who looked after six children, three boys and three girls. Cindy was a middle child but the oldest daughter. She became a registered nurse in July 1966. Five months later, she married South African-born Dr. Roy Makepeace.

They both worked at Vancouver General Hospital. (James was known as Cindy Makepeace until 1986, when she legally changed her name and moved to Richmond from Vancouver, ostensibly to try to elude the unknown assailant who terrorized her.) Bernard said green politics will grow in the NDP with or without the Green caucus "because it talks about limits to private property and has an alternate vision of society." The challenge to the Greens is to make alliances with labor, said Bernard, adding: "To the extent they can do that, they'll be hot." What is this new political force in the NDP? The Green caucus is a loosely-structured, ad-hoc group of environmentalists. It is not a formal body of the party. It has a mailing list of about 200 but no dues structure and no official membership list. However, the Green influence within the party is greater than its mailing list because preservation of wilderness areas like the Carmanah enjoys broad support in the party.

Gerry Scott, former provincial secretary, does not regard himself as a Green member but attended some caucus meetings last year. Scott stressed that support in the NDP for so-called Green positions such as the preservation of all of the Carmanah is more significant than the size of the rump group itself. Carmanah resolution "The concerns within the party are growing. The attitudes towards the environment will be there and probably the Green caucus too." Bernard said many NDPers support Green policies but have an aversion to separate caucuses which, they feel, tends to create factions and inhibit dialogue. Vancouver East MLA Glen Clark said the DP with or without the One note entered as evidence fiThis woman was whatever source In 1975, James was hired as team coordinator at Blenheim House, a day-treatment centre for children with emotional and behavior problems.

During her 12 years there, she earned the respect of her colleagues, including psychiatrists, for her competence. Roy and Cindy separated in July 1982. Her husband testified it was a "marriage made in heaven," but they grew apart when she would rather work in the garden than share his love of sailing. The obscene, threatening and "no talk" phone calls began on Oct. 7, 1982, two months afier her "trial" marriage separation.

On Oct. 15, she reported a rock was thrown through her back door window and someone entered her home. Nothing was taken or disturbed. OCT. 19, she reported JLOCAL POLITICS GLEN CLARK: 'overwhelmingly green' Greens is "overwhelmingly green." "Most of the policy past at the convention was green.

But the issue came down to that particular resolution on Carmanah. It became important that we bridge what was a developing gap between environmentalists and the IWA and I think we did that very effectively." Clark said the Greens do not pose a headache for Harcourt. "It's not at this point a problem for Harcourt," he said, "but if they're simply going to give us rhetoric, verbiage and strident language on obscure issues that won't be very constructive." The Clarks of the NDP see their party as a government-in-waiting and are prepared to seek compromise to win elections. However, many Greens feel the environmental behind in the garage. After two lie-detector tests showed she wasn't being entirely truthful about the incident, she changed her story and said a man had come to her back door and she initially thought it was McBride wearing a tuque.

When she opened the door, she said, the man cut her hand with the knife, grabbed her from behind and took her to the garage, where he and another man threatened her and her family. On Jan. 30, 1984, James was found unconscious with a paring knife jammed through the back of her hand almost to the palm. The knife pierced a bloody note with cut-and-paste letters from magazines. It read: "NOW YOU MUST DIE C---." The primary Vancouver police investigator at the scene, Const.

Kiyo Ikoma, testified he noticed blood smeared in circular patterns, on the kitchen floor. "It appeared somebody had wiped it," he said. Never in his 10-year police experience, he said, had he come across a crime scene where an assailant attempted to clean up the blood. James told police a man she thought he was a neighbor had come through the back gate and up the stairs. At the last moment, she battleground for the Greens.

"Carmanah isn't just a small area that a few nuts are concerned about, said Peacock. "Carmanah represents an attitude towards the environment." Already both sides have different interpretations of Harcourt's statement: "Read my lips: Don't log the Carmanah." Said Sanford: "The resolution passed was quite ambiguous but I think Harcourt's words were very clear and I was even surprised at how strong they were." IWA-Canada Local 1-85 president Earl Foxcroft said Harcourt ordered a study to appease the IWA faction while appearing to call for preservation. Foxcroft admits "it didn't come out that way," but he says he received assurances before Harcourt's fiery convention floor speech that the NDP leader had not ruled out logging. Whoever really won on the convention floor, the greens proved their resiliency in party elections afterwards. Sanford defeated Connie Munro, wife of IWA Canada leader Jack Munro, for a seat as regional representative on the party executive.

Then the greens helped unseat IWA vice-president Gerry Stoney as a party vice-president. He was defeated by green fellow-traveller Robinson. However, the Greens' influence as a political force as a group able to make or break nominations should not be overestimated, said Scott. "It was a mixed bag. It's hard to arrive at any definite conclusions." under siege from inside or out.

5 Dr. Anthony Marcus someone used a key to enter her house and meticulously slashed her pillow. The investigating officer, Vancouver police Const. Pat McBride, moved in with her Oct. 31 and moved out Dec.

1. He testified he was between apartments and needed a place to stay. "We were good friends," he said. Their relationship lasted about a year. McBride testified he received a no-talk call himself one night when Cindy was home.

He said the call might have come from the airport, since he heard a woman's voice on a public-address system in the background. The first attack occurred July 27, 1983, when Cindy was found slumped unconscious in the basement stairwell of her home. She had a black stocking tied tightly around her neck and cuts to her hand and leg. She originally told police a man attacked her from crisis is too acute for compromise and are less willing to soften their expectations for success at the ballot box. Which is perhaps why the Green caucus has failed to attract many key party members.

And why the caucus is still on the party's fringe though many of its positions are popular. Still many Green members are well-known in the party. Adrienne Peacock, an ecologist who teaches at Douglas College, led the recent strike there and was a former party vice-president and party candidate in Vancouver-Little Mountain. Larry Kuehn gained prominence during the Operation Solidarity campaign in 1983 as president of the B.C. Teachers Federation.

Kuehn is now a staff employee at the BCTF and writer for the leftish New Directions Magazine. Elected politicians Donna Sanford, daughter of former NDP MLA Karen Sanford, is completing a masters' degree in environmental planning. She is on the party's standing committee on the environment and its transportation committee. Elected politicians have also attended Green meetings but they are not considered members. Among these are MLAs Tom Perry of Vancouver-Point-Grey, David Zirnhelt of the Cariboo and environment critic John Cashore plus Bur-naby-Kingsway MP Svend Robinson.

The Carmanah Valley, where MacMillan Bloedel wants to harvest a limited area, has become the key Bv DOUG ARD land JUSTINE HUNTER I HEY WERE outgunned by politicians and labor at the pancnt Tou Viamnnrniin Partv convention but members of the party's environmentalist "green say they will not disappear. While DP leader Mike Harcourt 'averted a potentially explosive 'debate over the Carmanah Valley, Greens remain ready to press preservationist line, Their emergence represents a junique challenge for the NDP which is home for both forest workers, 'represented by the IWA Canada, Sand environmentalists. The Socreds Slack any serious environmentalist wing and so have been spared similar tension, Harcourt speaks bravely of forg-ang accords between both groups bver land use disputes but that road 'Will not be an easy one. Woodworkers are bound to press for logging in old-growth areas which some groups want to preserve. That pressure will continue to grow as forest corporations keep investing in technology which eliminates jobs and speeds the harvesting of forests.

The NDP's environmentalists possibly led by the Green caucus will press even harder for preserva-lion as old growth forests are logged. Green activist Donna Sanford said her group will continue. "We feel really encouraged over all. And our meetings at the convention were very well attended." Former party president Elaine 4 1 1.