On what would have been her 27th birthday, the aunt of Tamara Chipman says the discovery of a woman's body in Prince George is a startling reminder that not enough is being done to catch men who prey on women in B.C.'s north.
The human remains were found in a wooded area, not far from what's been dubbed the Highway of Tears, where Chipman herself disappeared a little more than five years ago.
"She left behind a little boy and it's Thanksgiving and it's also my daughter's birthday so it's a day we'll never forget," Gladys Radek told CTV News.
Eighteen women, including Chipman, have gone missing along the Highway 16 corridor between Prince George and Prince Rupert.
Police are treating this latest discovery as suspicious. Condom wrappers were found near the crime scene, a park investigators say is used frequently by sex trade workers.
Police are expecting more answers on this suspicious death from autopsy results. But Radek is convinced it's the work of multiple killers who have managed to escape the law.
"There's lots of perpetrators up there. There's lots of ghosts in the closets," she said.
Radek said she doesn't like how the women are characterized and stereotyped as having high-risk behaviours, even if they are working in the sex trade.
"As far as I'm concerned all women are vulnerable. All women are guilty of high risk behaviour by walking down the street in this country now," she said.
"They were put there for a reason. and that doesn't make them any less of a person because of what they're doing."
On Friday, Prince George RCMP asked for public assistance to locate two missing sex trade workers.
Thirty-five-year-old Cynthia Frances Maas and 23-year-old Natasha Lynn Montgomery were last seen on September 10 and late August, respectively.
Police say both women are known to have friends or family in another area.
In 2006, the RCMP launched a special investigation into the disappearances of women from the Highway of Tears.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Norma Reid
