‘It hurt really bad when she died’ Cold-case homicide victim’s brother relieved her suspected killer arrested after nearly 17 years, angry over loss By: Chris Kitching Posted: 6:33 PM CST Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024

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As years passed and the trail seemed to go cold, Joe Saunders never thought he’d see the day a suspect would be arrested in the 2007 slaying of his younger sister.

He had mixed emotions when Manitoba RCMP announced a second-degree murder charge against Crystal Saunders’ alleged killer Monday — relief and happiness, and anger toward the suspect.

“He was able to live his life and have a family, whereas my little sister didn’t. Her life was taken,” Joe Saunders told the Free Press at his Winnipeg home Thursday.

Former Winnipeg resident Kevin Queau, 42, is charged with second-degree murder. He had since moved to Vancouver, where he was arrested Saturday.

Saunders wants the public to remember his 24-year-old sister, who identified as Métis, as a loving and caring young woman, rather than for the challenges she faced in life.

“She always put people first before herself. She was a really kind person,” he said, while looking at photos laid out on a table in his living room.

The collection showed a glimpse of his sister’s life from childhood to becoming a young woman — gleeful smiles in school portraits, dressed up for an event at a church and relaxing on a sofa.

The personal photos are a break from mugshots — released during investigators’ appeals for tips — that have accompanied news stories since her death almost 17 years ago.

Saunders was last seen alive by an on-duty Winnipeg police officer the night of April 18, 2007. She was getting into a vehicle at Sargent Avenue and Sherbrook Street in the West End.

The next morning, an off-duty RCMP officer was checking his trapline when he found her body in a ditch near the Lake Manitoba community of St. Ambroise, about 75 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg.

“He was able to live his life and have a family, whereas my little sister didn’t. Her life was taken”–Joe Saunders

RCMP said Queau and Saunders were in contact the night she was last seen, but did not provide further details.

In 2007, Saunders’ mother, Sandra, told the Free Press her vulnerable daughter struggled with drug addiction and was forced into the sex trade and feared for her life.

Saunders grew up in the North End, where she attended St. John’s High School. She would have turned 40 last year.

She had a young daughter, who wasn’t in her care, when she died, her brother said.

He said Saunders was his biological niece but became a sister to him when she was adopted as a baby and raised by her grandmother — and his mother — Eileen Saunders.

The grandmother lived with the anguish of the unsolved murder until she died in 2017.

“It was very hard on her,” he said. “She’d be happy that (a suspect) has been found.”

He last talked to his sister a week before she died. He told her he would help her to overcome her troubles.

“I was always concerned for her,” he said. “It hurt really bad when she died.”

Saunders fell in with the wrong crowd and was taken advantage of; she was being used by people she thought cared about her, he added.

“It was very hard for her to get away from that scene,” he said.

A few years ago, he was walking near Main Street and Henry Avenue, when he saw a billboard with his sister’s face on it. The sign featured a message asking: “Who killed me?”

It was put up by Project Devote, a Manitoba police task force assembled to look into the unsolved cases of more than two dozen missing or murdered exploited people, mostly women.

Saunders hasn’t been informed about any of the details of his sister’s slaying. He had never heard of Queau before Monday’s announcement.

“I want him to serve the rest of his life in jail and never get freedom, and ask God for forgiveness for what he’s done”–Joe Saunders

He said the arrest brought some peace, but he will not have closure until there is a conviction and a prison sentence.

“I want him to serve the rest of his life in jail and never get freedom, and ask God for forgiveness for what he’s done,” he said.

RCMP said Queau is not a suspect in other unsolved crimes, but officers are continuing with their investigation. Efforts were underway to bring him to Winnipeg for court proceedings.

Police said Queau was identified as a suspect in Saunders’ death thanks to a DNA match. DNA found on her remains was entered into the databank in 2014, but further investigative work was required before a suspect could be charged.

In 2015, Queau was sentenced to five years in prison, after pleading guilty in Vancouver to sexually assaulting a woman and to the aggravated assault of a second woman.

He was ordered to provide a DNA sample for a national databank.

His statutory release was revoked in 2019 due to extensive breaches of special conditions, according to a Parole Board of Canada document obtained by the Free Press Thursday.

A review found “deceptive” and “manipulative” Queau visited escort and dating websites, where he communicated with women, and looked up an alleged sex worker he claimed to be concerned about. Queau had added the person’s family member on social media.

He also failed to report details of his relationship with a woman he proposed to after a few months of dating.

His then-partner “was aware you had been with prostitutes in the past, which you denied,” the document said.

The review found Queau accessed pornography while on statutory release.

“Viewing pornographic material may also elevate attitudes that support violence and the objectification of women as sex objects,” the document said.

A specialized sex offender assessment in 2017 found Queau was at a moderate to high risk of reoffending, and his risk of harm toward intimate partners was high.

The board said he posed an undue risk to the public, despite participating in sex offender programs and other forms of treatment and counselling.

The document said Queau reported being sexually assaulted by a male when he was younger, and his parents becoming “very strict” with him after a death in the family.

He told the board his family denied their Métis heritage and he felt isolated, and he continued to feel lonely and engage in an unhealthy social lifestyle as an adult, following a “rebellious” adolescence.

The review cited concerns about his consumption of alcohol.

Queau’s sentence — and special conditions — ended in 2020. Friends said he had a child from a previous relationship, recently got married and worked in construction.

Joe Saunders, meanwhile, hopes the arrest brings hope to families of people whose slayings remain unsolved.

“This shouldn’t happen to anybody,” he said. “I hope it never happens to anybody ever again.”

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca