A native of Vancouver, British Columbia, born on New Years 1940, Clifford Olson spent most of his li
A native of Vancouver, British Columbia, born on New Years 1940, Clifford Olson spent most of his life in trouble with the police. Remembered as a bully in school, he logged 94 separate arrests in the quarter century between 1957 and 1981, serving time on charges that ranged from fraud to armed robbery and sexual assault. In prison, Olson was known as a homosexual rapist and sometime informer, once coaching fellow inmate Gary Marcoux in writing a detailed confession to the rape and mutilation-murder of a nine-year-old girl, then surfacing as a prosecution witness at the trial where the letters were used to convict Marcoux. Back on the street, Olson kept up his role as a police stool pigeon, moving in with the mother of his illegitimate son. In November 1980, 12-year-old Christine Weller was abducted from home in the Vancouver suburb of Surrey, her mutilated body found in the woods, south of town, on Christmas Day. Colleen Daignault, age 13, vanished from Surrey on April 16, and 16-year-old Darren Johnsrud was abducted from a Vancouver shopping mall less than a week later, found dead on May 2, his skull shattered by heavy blows. Olson finally got around to marrying his girlfriend on May 15, 1981, and 16-year-old Sandra Wolfsteiner disappeared four days later, while hitchhiking through suburban Langley. On June 21, 13-year-old Ada Court was reported missing at Coquitlam, when she failed to return home from a babysitting job. Judy Kozma, 14, disappeared on July 9, her mutilated body recovered from Lake Weaver, near Agassiz in the Frazer Valley, on July 25. By that time, Olson was already considered a suspect in the various deaths and disappearances, his name first mentioned at a law enforcement conference on July 15. Despite sporadic surveillance of their man, police were unable to prevent him from claiming four more victims in the last week of July. Fifteen-year-old Raymond King disappeared from New Westminster on July 23, his body recovered from the shore of Lake Weaver two weeks later. On July 25, 18-year-old Sigrun Arnd was abducted and killed while thumbing rides near Vancouver, her remains finally identified through dental charts. Terri Carson vanished from the same Surrey housing complex where Christine Weller had lived, her corpse joining the list of those recovered from Lake Weaver. On July 30, 17-year-old Louise Chartrand disappeared while hitchhiking at Maple Ridge. Officers trailing Olson arrested him days later, after he picked up two female hitchhikers on Vancouver Island. The girls were unharmed, but a search of his van turned up an address book, containing the name of Judy Kozma. Formally charged with her murder six days later, Olson started dealing with the prosecution, striking a bargain that would net his wife and child $10,000 per victim, in return for information on four known murders and directions to the six outstanding bodies. Olson made good on his part of the controversial deal, and the money was paid on schedule. On January 11, 1982, he pled guilty to eleven counts of murder and was sentenced to eleven concurrent life terms. -- source link