CRIM 131 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Robert Pickton
7 Jun 2018
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Lecture 2: HIGHWAY OF TEARS MONDAY 15TH, JANUARY 2018
Highway of Tears
●Highway 16 (aka Highway of Tears), last 40 years there has been lots of disappearances
and murders. The majority were aboriginal women.
●Claim that the police were not doing enough to protect Aboriginal women
●Highway of Tears: nucleus on issue of how the Aboriginal people are treated
●Job of serial killers and opportunistic copycats
●Lots of people are unaware of the situation (people start to gain awareness until it
happened to people’s relatives)
●Situation got more well known when a white canadian women disappeared, previous to
a lot of Aboriginal women and girls had gone missing
○Highway of Tears became a more publicized situation
○Aboriginal disappearances were not getting the attention until this incident
happened
●A lot of issues within Aboriginal communities (e.g. poverty, unemployment, border
schools)
○Schools: children were brought in in order to take the ‘Indian’ out of them.
Children were not allowed to practice their own tradition, and were brought up
to follow the European tradition models.
○Children were taken away from their home and deprived from good living
conditions
●FIrst Nations look at RCMP not as someone they can trust, but rather as someone who
might violate their rights
○Ramsay Case: judge was sexually exploiting girls as young as 12, in the
community
○Nothing has changed since then in order to make sure this doesn’t happen again
○F.N. women offer more extreme violence
●Very small percentage of sexual and domestic assault is actually reported
○Huge psychological and emotional impact on victims of assaults
○Being within this environment normalizes the situation
●Aboriginals are trying to create awareness of the situation
●Resources within the community are not always accessible (people living a different
reality). A lot of back and forth is needed and there is a shortage of public transportation
or there is a lack of money.
○A lot of people acquire vices (alcohols, gambling, drugs) in order to pass the time
and look for ways to find money (gambling, stealing)
○Hitchhiking was an acceptable form of transportation, however with the recent
incidents its is not considered normal anymore
●SImilar Issue: Pig Farm murder by Robert Pickton
Document Summary
Highway 16 (aka highway of tears), last 40 years there has been lots of disappearances and murders. Claim that the police were not doing enough to protect aboriginal women. Highway of tears: nucleus on issue of how the aboriginal people are treated. Job of serial killers and opportunistic copycats. Lots of people are unaware of the situation (people start to gain awareness until it happened to people"s relatives) Situation got more well known when a white canadian women disappeared, previous to a lot of aboriginal women and girls had gone missing. Highway of tears became a more publicized situation. Aboriginal disappearances were not getting the attention until this incident happened. A lot of schools) issues within aboriginal communities (e. g. poverty, unemployment, border. Schools: children were brought in in order to take the indian" out of them. Children were not allowed to practice their own tradition, and were brought up to follow the european tradition models.
