I would like to thank the numerous police officers across Alberta with whom I worked during my 16 years as a crime reporter with the Calgary Sun. They helped me with background information on many of the cases in this book. Most of these officers were with the Calgary Police Service. Especially, I want to thank all the “secret sources” among them, who have had to remain anonymous at all times. You know who you are!
To Calgary staff sergeant George Rocks, who was head of the homicide unit for years and never once lost patience with me bugging him for more information at all hours of the day and night, I thank you for all your help.
Thanks so much to my wife, Amanda, who has endured me talking about murders and dismemberments, and hangings and blood-spatterings, all the time I was writing the book. And thanks for allowing our house to be filled from study to attic with my murder files, notebooks and newspaper cuttings. Her computer skills have been invaluable at times in saving me when parts of the book were in danger of disappearing into cyberspace forever.
I am grateful for the constant help I received from Barbara Van Orden, the librarian at the Quadra Branch of the Vancouver Island Regional Library, who found every reference I needed in researching the book. My thanks also to Johnnie Bachusky, a fellow journalist and author, who steered me towards this book. I wish to thank my editor, Dianne Smyth, for reining me in when I was enthusiastically over-loquacious. She made this a better book to read.