Alexandra Wiwcharuk, Johnny Cash's Girl in Saskatoon

"Murder at the Riverbank"
"The dead cannot cry out for justice. It is a duty of the living to do so for them."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUAl4fxM_XA
http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/Shows/the+fifth+estate/ID/1368434248/

I am Alexandra

My name is Alexandra Wiwcharuk.

I had a wonderful life, wonderful parents and great friends. I was Johnny Cash’s girl in Saskatoon, a Beauty Queen, a dedicated Nurse and a good friend to all. It was all taken from me that night. No one believes, that terrible things like this can happen to someone.

It was 1962, a warm spring evening and I went down for a walk by the river. Everything happened so fast. I was savagely beaten until I lost consciousness, viciously raped and buried alive in a shallow grave.

My family and friends were so distraught. Why couldn’t the police find me? My body was only a few feet away from where they were searching.

Thirteen days later my partially nude, battered and bruised body was found by a group of young children.

It has been almost 50 years since I was brutally murdered and no one has found my killers. I know the answers to my murder but, like my body all those years ago, they remain just out of reach.

My body was exhumed in 2004 to search for more evidence but still nothing. Missing evidence, alleged police corruption and whispers of political cover ups shroud my case. It’s up to you now, you are the Voice of the Dead, speaking for those who cannot. Only you can help solve my murder. My family still cries for justice, they want “Justice for Alex”.

- See more at: http://justiceforalex.com/network/alexandra-wiwcharuk


The Murder

It is a crime that has haunted a city for almost 50 years.

On a warm, Spring evening in Saskatoon in 1962, Alexandra Wiwcharuk went for a walk along the bank of the South Saskatchewan River and then disappeared. Two weeks later, her body was found in a shallow grave. Exactly what happened to Alex Wiwcharuk that night is still not completely known and her killer remains unidentified and unpunished.
The crime was so brutal, so shocking that, to this day, local people can still recall where they were when they heard the news. Alex Wiwcharuk’s large, close-knit family was shattered.

The Wiwcharuk family had put their hopes and dreams into Alex’s future. In 1961 Alex, the only member of her family to be educated beyond high school, graduated from nursing school and began work at the City Hospital in Saskatoon. She was a pretty and vivacious young woman who that year was chosen “The Girl In Saskatoon” in a contest sponsored by a local radio station to promote a concert by country singer Johnny Cash. At the concert, Cash sang his song, “The Girl In Saskatoon” to Alex in front of an arena filled with fans.

The police investigation into Alex’s murder dragged on and eventually the case went cold. But, it stayed alive in the minds of the young woman’s friends and family. Sharon Butala, now one of Canada’s best-known writers, attended high school with Alex Wiwcharuk and continued to be haunted by her death. In 2003, she contacted the fifth estate and told Linden MacIntyre about Alex’s death and the lingering mystery of her murder. The result of that conversation was a fifth estate documentary, “Death of a Beauty Queen.” The murder case had also stayed alive in the minds of the Saskatoon police and “Death of a Beauty Queen” traced their attempts, at the time of the crime and more recently, to find Alex’s killer.

Now, in a new documentary, “The Girl In Saskatoon,” MacIntyre and a fifth estate team return to the city and the story, this time, to meet four women for whom Alex’s murder is intensely personal. Patty Storie, who formed this group with Lorain Phillips, Lynn Gratrix and Gwen Taralson. are all nieces of Alex Wiwcharuk. They were young girls at the time of their aunt’s death, but made a pledge to each other at that time that they would find, as one of them says, “Justice for Alex.”

Call it a quest, call it an obsession; these women want not only justice for their aunt, but also to close the book on a decades-old cold case and perhaps, finally, bring peace to a family and a community.


- See more at: http://justiceforalex.com/network/alexandra-wiwcharuk/the murder


It grows increasingly interesting as how many twists and turns her life has taken. For instance, in 1961 being Johnny Cash's "Girl in Saskatoon", he serenaded her on stage. Now, you are not going to believe this but, remember in 2008, Clint Eastwood bought the rights to the book, "Road Out of Hell" by Anthony Flacco co-written by Jerry Clark who's father was the reason for this book. You remember the movie that came out the same year called "The Changling" starring Angelina Jolie, well..Sanfork Clark was the young boy who helped his crazy Uncle Northcott kill all those poor little boys....
Well, Sandford Clark (The Changeling) when he was sent back to Canada, grew up and had a family of his own, little did my Aunt Alexandra know at the time or at anytime for that matter was that she had moved in right behind this man, right behind in 1961 with three other nurses. Ten months later she was dead, brutally beaten, savagely raped and buried alive.

I need to get a hold of Clint Eastwood, any suggestions??