‘We’re not garbage,’ grief-stricken father of serial killer’s victim says, pleading for start of landfill search By: Tyler Searle Posted: 11:27 AM CDT Thursday, Mar. 27, 2025 Last Modified: 7:43 PM CDT Thursday, Mar. 27, 2025 Updates

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“We’re not garbage. Nobody is garbage.”

Anguished father Albert Shingoose, voice raised and fist in the air, called on police and politicians Thursday to move ahead quickly with a search of Winnipeg’s Brady Road landfill for the remains of his daughter Ashlee, who was murdered by a serial killer in 2022.

Winnipeg Police Service investigators travelled 450 kilometres to St. Theresa Point First Nation Tuesday to deliver the heartbreaking news to Shingoose and his wife Theresa: convicted killer Jeremy Skibicki’s previously unidentified victim — who had been given the name Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe (Buffalo Woman) by Indigenous elders — was 30-year-old Ashlee, last seen outside a downtown homeless shelter three years ago.

“I need your words. I need your voices — speak up,” Albert Shingoose told a news conference in Winnipeg hosted by the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Thursday, issuing a public plea for support from the public for a search.

“The landfill is not a burial ground for anybody.”

Skibicki was convicted last July for the murders of Shingoose, Morgan Harris, 39, Marcedes Myran, 24, and Rebecca Contois, 24 — all Indigenous women he targeted after meeting them at homeless shelters early in 2022. He admitted to killing them but pleaded not guilty, his defence arguing he could not be criminally responsible because of a mental disorder.

Albert Shingoose, who spent several weeks desperately searching for Ashlee in January 2023, said he and his wife were blindsided by Tuesday’s news, but there was some relief to finally know what happened to her.

“We looked at each other and we cried, but it was a happy, happy cry,” he said.

He, Theresa and Ashlee’s sister provided DNA samples to police in January 2023 that failed to make the identification because of an error in the forensics process, he said, adding he always believed his daughter was Buffalo Woman.

Partial remains of Harris and Myran were recently recovered from the Prairie Green Landfill north of Winnipeg. Remains of Contois were recovered from a North Kildonan garbage bin and the Brady landfill in May 2022.

Investigators believe Shingoose’s remains are at Brady. Winnipeg police said Wednesday they will support search efforts there.

That commitment is a reversal from the stance taken by the WPS in 2022, when then-police chief Danny Smyth said that while investigators believed the remains of Myran and Harris were buried at Prairie Green, a search would be unfeasible.

Premier Wab Kinew pledged Wednesday that a search of the Brady landfill will happen but cautioned it would take time to work out the logistics.

Albert Shingoose said he was happy to hear officials commit to finding his daughter.

He offered a red tobacco tie (as a symbol of respect in Indigenous culture) to Thelma Morriseau, one of the elders who gave his daughter her spirit name, Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe.

“This has really touched me,” Morriseau said Thursday, after accepting the gift. “We wanted her to have a name because she deserved it, because she was important.”

“The landfill is not a burial ground for anybody.”–Albert Shingoose

Theresa Shingoose, flanked by her eldest daughter and two granddaughters, said Ashlee was “a loving person.”

“I felt that I would not be able to say anything because the pain is so strong,” she said. “And it is hard, but there is a release of knowing… she’ll come home soon.”

She described her daughter as a polite and well-behaved child who never spoke back to her parents, and as Ashlee grew older and had children of her own, she was a committed and caring mother.

St. Theresa Point Chief Raymond Flett, who was a teacher and principal at his community’s school, said Ashlee was happy, well-behaved and studious as a girl.

“That’s how I want to remember her,” he said.

Theresa Shingoose said she became concerned when Ashlee got mixed up with “the wrong kind of friends” and began to use drugs and alcohol. She eventually took over care of her grandchildren while Ashlee struggled to find her way.

On Thursday, she spoke of the pain in having to tell Ashlee’s young son his mother had been identified and was dead.

“I wanted to tell him before somebody else told him. I wanted to be there for him. Right away he started crying. He ran to his room, closed the door and I could hear him crying inside the room,” she said, pausing to wipe tears from her eyes.

Amid the sorrow and uncertainty surrounding Ashlee’s disappearance, the family was struck by tragedy in March 2023 when her daughter Dayna Shingoose and another 14-year-old girl were found dead outside in St. Theresa Point after being exposed to extreme cold for several hours.

The teen had struggled with her mother’s disappearance, the grief-stricken grandmother previously told the Free Press.

Theresa said she, too, has struggled, but was able to regain her resolve through Indigenous ceremony and prayer.

“I talked to the Creator, I said, ‘If it is your will, then it will be,’” she said. “I felt that (Ashlee) will be found, that she will come home, and I’ve been thinking about these other people that are lost. I pray for them, too. Let’s not forget.”

The identification of Ashlee has renewed calls for justice for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

“The pain is so strong….  but there is a release of knowing… she’ll come home soon.”–Theresa Shingoose

Shingoose’s parents and Premier Wab Kinew met privately while attending a sacred fire in honour of Ashlee and in support of her family at the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre for Truth and Reconciliation on Thursday night.

Afterward, Albert and Theresa Shingoose spoke to attendees to thank them for their support. Albert Shingoose said his daughter will continue to be known as Buffalo Woman.

“We want her to carry that name,” he said.

The couple said community support has helped them through hard times. “It was a hard journey… wondering where my daughter is, always waiting for her, hoping,” Theresa Shingoose said. “But now we know what’s happening.”

Kinew repeated a promise to search the Brady Road landfill while addressing the crowd.

“We’re going to put in the work to search the Brady landfill, and we’re going to try to bring Ashlee home,” he said.

“We’re so honoured to be able to support the family of Ashlee Shingoose, and show them what they mean to this community and what their daughter means to this community,” said Sandra DeLaronde, chair of Giganawenimaanaanig, formerly known as the Manitoba MMIWG2S+ implementation committee.

The organization said systemic and regulatory changes are still urgently needed, including the implementation of the Red Dress Alert system and the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls‘ 231 calls for justice.

tyler.searle@freepress.mb.ca

With files from Chris Kitching

Tyler Searle
Reporter

Tyler Searle is a multimedia producer who writes for the Free Press’s city desk. A graduate of Red River College Polytechnic’s creative communications program, he wrote for the Stonewall Teulon Tribune, Selkirk Record and Express Weekly News before joining the paper in 2022. Read more about Tyler.

Every piece of reporting Tyler produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.