18 months on investigator still searches for leads

The Private Investigator who has been looking for leads into the disappearances of the Highway of Tears continues to receive information and has plans to get to Prince Rupert at the end of the month to continue his search.

Ray Michalko, a retired RCMP officer has been donating his time and working on the cases for the last eighteen months, passing on leads to the investigating RCMP.

Despite those efforts, there has been little progress on the disappearances and little closure for those families affected by the tragedies.

The Daily News featured an update on Michalko's efforts in the Friday paper.

Private detective focussed on road ahead
By Kris Schumacher
The Daily News
Friday, July 06, 2007

It's been a 18 months since Ray Michalko began investigating the many disappearances along the Highway of Tears, and he's still searching for answers.

A retired RCMP officer with his own private investigation firm, Michalko has been tirelessly dedicating 40 hours a week since January 2006 to the many unsolved cases. All of which is time he has donated in his spare time, on top of the work he is paid to do by clients.

"I continue to receive calls from people giving me tips and leads which I've been following up as far as I can take them, and then handing them over to the RCMP," said Michalko of progress he has made. "It's a long uphill battle, there's no question. But I've believed from the beginning and still continue to believe there are people out there that know something, and somehow we have to find a way to get them to come forward and talk about it. And I think that's the key to solving some of these cases."

While he will not criticize the police for the way the have handled any of the cases to this point, he does feel strongly that there's a lot of work yet to be done.

"Look, 10 or more young women have been murdered or gone missing over the same period of time, and not one of these cases have been solved. Why?" asks Michalko. "It's not fair to criticize police, because they don't tell me what they're doing in their investigation. And rarely do they ever tell anyone that. So until they've had success we don't really know what they're doing."

The information only goes one way, from Michalko to the RCMP. And publicly, he feels they've been polite' to his undertaking of a private investigation. But as a private investigator, he holds no power of arrest, and does not have the ability to obtain search warrants or employ many of the standard police techniques.

"I've been able to turn over information on a number of occasions to the RCMP. Whether you would call it suspects' or just information that needs followed up more thoroughly is [not for me to say]," said Michalko. "So there comes a point where I can only go so far."

Every so often he will receive a call from someone with information or an anonymous tip which he then looks into, often times requiring him to travel. He's only been as far west as Terrace to date, but he'll be making a trip to Prince Rupert at the end of the month to follow some leads.

"What I try to do is gather as much information as I can and then organize these things so I'm not running here and there and everywhere, and able to do two or three things at once," Michalko said.

The dedicated PI is not involved in any fundraising, and does not try to solicit donations for his efforts. But despite not seeking support, a group of charitable women from Port Coquitlam have stepped up to do just that.

"This group of women volunteered to help pay some of my hard costs," said Michalko. "It's been really good because they're helping to pay for my air fare, car rental, motel, and I'm basically supplying the time. So it's made it much more viable for me."

"We heard about Ray back in November," said Nancy Ray, one of the six women in Port Coquitlam who founded the Highway of Tears Trust fund to support Michalko's investigation.

"And I had not heard of the Highway of Tears prior to hearing about Ray. So there's all this uproar about missing women from East Vancouver and the Pickton trial, yet nothing's been mentioned about Highway 16."

Michalko agrees.

"Up North awareness has been much better, there's been a dozen stories written in local papers and I think that's great," he said, acknowledging he gets multiple phone calls every time a story runs. "But I think in the Lower Mainland not a lot of people know about it, and I think anywhere east of B.C., probably nobody knows about it."

It's been difficult for him to continue pursuing leads and tips for 18 months without having to speak with the families and friends of the missing or deceased girls.

"I purposely set out to not talk to any of the families who've lost kids because I didn't want to raise false hope," said Michalko. "But over the last year and a half I've had to talk to some of them to ask some questions and verify some information, and their support is unreal. They're extremely supportive, so it makes it easier for me to keep going."

As far as setting a goal for how much time he's willing to put into the investigation before admitting he's done all he can do, Michalko doesn't like to think about it.

"A good friend of mine asked me that question the other day, and I really had to think about it," Michalko said. "I took the easy way out in January and said I'd put in another year, with the idea that [next January] I'd assess what I've got, whether I've done any good, and whether it's worth carrying on or not."

But already he's hesitant about thinking of throwing in the towel.

"I don't know what I'll do, because the whole thing has taken on a life of it's own," he said. "And I'm addicted to it. So it'd be hard to walk away. And I suppose at some point I may have to walk away, but I prefer not to think about that."

Assuredly, no one else in the province wants to think about that outcome either.

Anyone with information regarding any of the missing person cases or murders along Highway 16 and people interested in supporting Michalko's probe can call 604-831-5585.