Toronto Star Referrer

Pair of murders in the 1980s stunned city

Deaths of nanny, cheerleader brought increased sense of vulnerability for women across GTA

PETER EDWARDS STAFF REPORTER

Christine Prince was extra alert when she went off to see a movie in downtown Toronto with friends. Nineteen-year-old Toronto Argonauts cheerleader Jenny Isford had been raped and murdered less than a month before and the killer hadn’t been caught.

“Don’t worry, I’m very careful,” Prince told friends. The Welsh nanny didn’t really need to be warned. She was by nature a careful person.

That was one reason she was so valued by the GTA lawyer’s family that employed her as a live-in nanny to help with their three-year-old daughter.

At five-foot-three and 126 pounds, the 25-year-old Prince wasn’t physically imposing, by any stretch. She was likeable and cautious.

The night of Sunday, June 20, 1982, was drizzly, and she carried an umbrella, which gave her a weapon of sorts. After watching a movie at Yonge and Bloor, she chatted with her friends in a downtown restaurant. Around 1:30 a.m. on Monday morning, she took a St. Clair Avenue West streetcar, getting off five blocks from her employer’s Pinewood Avenue home.

What happened next continues to baffle police.

Perhaps a stranger called out for help as she walked home, pretending to need help. “We believe that the perpetrator or perpetrators were waiting in a vehicle,” acting Det. Sgt. Stephen Smith of Toronto police said in a video police made to call attention to the case. “They may have called her over. Her being a good person, she went over to give them directions or whatever.”

Her umbrella was found in the middle of Pinewood Avenue.

“If she had went willingly with them, she would have taken her umbrella,” Smith said. “So we believe she was taken right from the street.”

Back then, dashboard cameras and CCTV weren’t omnipresent, so police have no vehicle or suspect description. It’s very possible there were two or more people who abducted her, Smith said, noting: “It would be very difficult to overpower someone and drive.”

The attacker or attackers drove her across the city, through a wooded area near the Metro Toronto Zoo to a popular lovers’ lane area. The rough terrain there made investigators wonder if the killer had a fourwheel-drive vehicle.

There were multiple sightings of her nude, battered body later Monday morning, as she lay face down in shallow water in the West Rouge River in Scarborough. “Is this the ideal dumping spot?” Smith asked. “I would say, no.” Police later heard about reports of a woman’s screams from the area early that morning.

Investigators can’t be sure if she was killed near the bridge or in a residence. They also wonder why her attacker drove all the way across the city to dump the body in an area where it was quickly and easily found.

After her murder, the killer or killers doubled back across the city, as her wallet — containing ID and $2 — was found by a roadworker on Highway 401 west of Morningside Avenue. “They obviously had knowledge of this area as well as the downtown area of Toronto,” Smith said.

Investigators wonder if the killer or killers were stupid and lucky when they dumped the body and wallet. “They were taking no care to cover their tracks,” Smith said. “They may have panicked when they found out she was deceased.”

Immediately after Prince’s body was found, comparisons were made to Isford’s murder.

They were both young. They were both sexually assaulted. No effort was made to conceal either of their bodies. They were both careful people with plenty to live for. They were both killed on rainy nights.

Prince and Isford were both getting off TTC vehicles when police believe they were attacked. Isford had spent much of the evening of Thursday, May 27, 1982, practising cheerleader dance routines at the German Canadian Club.

Then she shared a drink with more than a dozen Argonauts boosters at Tramps restaurant, before catching a ride to the subway station.

Isford transferred from a subway to a Bayview Avenue bus, which got her almost home.

Several hours later, her partly nude body and scattered clothing were found five doors from her parents’ North York home. Oddly, her shoes were left side-by-side.

She had been raped and strangled. Police thought Isford was probably followed to her home from the Bayview Avenue bus stop at about 1:30 a.m. on May 28, 1982.

Prince and Isford were both considered victims of strangers — the toughest homicides to solve. “The most difficult murder to solve is the blitz sex attack,” Insp. Wayne Oldham, a former member of Metro’s homicide squad, told the Star at the time.

“What makes our job so difficult is that, in a stranger-to-stranger situation like that, there is no evidence that identifies the offender.”

Prince had come to Canada the previous October from tiny Porthcawl on the coast of south Wales and planned to spend a year in Toronto and then possibly attend university. “She was a good girl who just wanted to help people,” her father told the Star shortly after the murder. “She was really interested in working with handicapped children and only took the job in Canada so she could work with children.”

While in Toronto, she met an English chef and they were engaged to be married that October. Her fiancé cooperated fully with police, which included giving a full statement and a DNA sample, police said.

The unsolved murders brought an increased sense of vulnerability for women across the GTA. The media reported a boost in self-defence classes and in lessons offering safety tips for women.

Police canvassed known sex offenders, including one in Saskatoon. The city’s police commission set up a committee to find ways of eliminating violence against women and children on the streets.

As the commission was set up, police Chief Jack Ackroyd said that only one of 10 rapes are ever reported to police. There were also hopes new laser beam technology might detect fingerprints from the bodies.

In the end, Prince’s body was flown back to Wales, and a memorial was held for her near Pinewood Avenue at Humewood Park, where she had loved to spend quiet moments. A tree was planted there in her honour.

A spokesperson for the group that planted the tree told the Star that “neighbours often saw her enjoying walks in the area and in the park and they appreciated her cheerfulness and her warm smile. The neighbours hope the Christine Prince tree will remind everyone that we live in a safe, welcome place.”

In 1993, a fresh look at the Prince and Isford murders was taken by police after Paul Bernardo was arrested for the slayings of Leslie Mahaffy and Kristen French.

Nothing panned out there either, but William Brett Henson was convicted in 1997. Henson was an appliance store clerk who lived with his mother. Court heard he had a lengthy criminal record for sexual assault and burglary. He sexually assaulted three women after murdering Isford.

He was sentenced to life in prison. Prince’s murder remains unsolved.

Christine Prince and Jenny Isford were both considered victims of strangers — the toughest homicides to solve.

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2021-11-28T08:00:00.0000000Z

2021-11-28T08:00:00.0000000Z

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