Manitoba PCs apologize to families of murdered women believed to be in Winnipeg-area landfill

Manitoba's Opposition Progressive Conservatives apologized to the families of four First Nations women murdered by a serial killer in 2022 for refusing to search a Winnipeg-area landfill where it's believed the remains of two of the women were taken.

"Honourable Speaker, our government erred. It's as simple as that," interim PC Leader Wayne Ewasko said during question period at the Manitoba Legislature on Wednesday. 

"We went forward and followed advice to emphasize prosecution above all. We lost our way in regards to empathy and also lost our way in regards to closure being brought forward to the families of the victims," Ewasko said.

While in government, the Progressive Conservatives, under then premier Heather Stefanson, said the province would not help fund the search for two women believed to be in the Prairie Green landfill, citing health and safety concerns for workers and low prospects of success.

The decision not to search the landfill for Morgan Harris, 39, and Marcedes Myran, 26, led to widespread anger among the families of the victims, First Nations leaders and community members. 

An advertisement run by the PC Party before the October 2023 provincial election, in which the PCs were defeated by the NDP, said, "For health and safety reasons, the answer on the landfill dig just has to be no."

Ewasko said the party is offering an "unconditional apology" to the families and that they have his word the party will "be better."

When Ewasko was asked by reporters afterwards if he was apologizing for the ad campaign, the language used or the refusal to search the landfill, he said it was a "combination of everything." 

Cambria Harris, a daughter of Morgan Harris, said she feels conflicted about the public apology, saying no one from the PCs has contacted the family privately to apologize or discuss a human rights complaint she filed against the party over a year ago.

"I acknowledge the apology that was made today, but you know, if it wasn't for those actions of the previous PC government, my family wouldn't have been standing at the landfill today waiting for our loved ones to be brought home," she told CBC. 

"Apologizing is one thing, but actually taking accountability and changing your actions to ensure tragedy doesn't happen like that again will say otherwise." 

Morgan Harris and Myran, both originally from Long Plain First Nation, were two of the victims of Jeremy Skibicki, who was convicted last July of four counts of first-degree murder in their killings, and in the deaths of Rebecca Contois, 24, from O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation, and a still-unidentified woman who has been given the name Mashkode Bizhiki'ikwe, or Buffalo Woman, by community leaders.

Contois's partial remains were found in a garbage bin near Skibicki's apartment in Winnipeg in mid-May 2022. More of her remains were found at the city-run Brady Road landfill in June 2022. The remains of Mashkode Bizhiki'ikwe have never been found.

Police have said they believe she was Indigenous and in her 20s.