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- [00:01]
A
Hey there, it's Nick. Before I play today's episode, I've got some big news for you. Love and Radio's long awaited Season 10 is finally coming. I'll begin dropping weekly episodes on February 2nd, although Patreon and Apple subscribers will be able to listen to the entire season a week early. For season 10, I'm doing something completely different. I'm focusing on a single 11 part story, which is the culmination of decades of interviews and reporting, and I seriously cannot wait to share it with you. And it's not just me that thinks it's going to be good. The Pilot Episode 1 Best Independent Nonfiction Podcast at this year's Tribeca Festival. I'll have more details out in December in this feed, but in the meantime, I could use your help spreading the word that Love and Radio is finally back. Tell everyone you know at that Halloween party next week. Make your family uncomfortable at this year's Thanksgiving even more so than usual. Or you could even post about it on a social media website if that's a thing that you like to do. I've heard that TikTok is a popular one. Their URL is for now. Enjoy this story made in collaboration with producer Katie Davis. Thank you for listening and thank you for your patience. It will be worth the wait.
- [01:37]
B
We were at the kitchen table when there was a knock on the door. I just suspected that it would be somebody coming back for gloves or something. They'd forgotten there was a stranger at the door. He was a tall man dressed in black, very handsome. He said he'd come to tell us what to expect. We invited him to the kitchen table and there we sat for two hours and he ate some of the pie and he talked and talked and talked. He told us that it had just destroyed his life.
- [02:18]
A
You're listening to Love and Radio. I'm Nick Van Der Kolk. Today's episode Morning Splendor featuring Wilma Dirksen.
- [02:33]
C
Let's talk about your relationship with your late husband, Cliff. Tell me a little bit about the early part of your relationship.
- [02:41]
B
Well, I grew up in B.C. and it was custom for us as young girls just graduating out of high school to go to a Bible school in Saskatchewan. So that's what I did. Cliff says that he saw me almost immediately and apparently it was love at first sight for him. I had no clue. He pursued me for two years. He continued to pursue me even when I said no. The fun part about it was he actually then went out with another girl. And that's when I got jealous. I realized I couldn't live without him.
- [03:14]
C
What did marriage and the idea of starting a family, what did all of that mean to you?
- [03:19]
B
Well, we were very traditional. I didn't kiss any boy until the boy would actually propose to me. So when he proposed to me, it was a huge commitment for both of us. I was 21 years old when we got married. First baby came about a year later. Candace, she was such a surprise. She was just such a beautiful baby. She just grabbed everybody's attention. She had this shock of black hair. We'd go to a mall and we'd let her walk. And everybody would stop and stare at this little thing walking along and just talking to everybody. I remember one time when I was supposed to put on a birthday party for a little boy at camp, and I was just tired, and I had no imagination for it. And so I says, candice, why don't you just put on a party? Well, she put on a party like you wouldn't believe. She had everything arranged in the cabin. There were whistles and there were bells and there were balloons, and everything was just perfectly set out as a party. And she was only about 9, 10 years old at this point. She just had this charisma, this beautiful attraction to everybody. I'd see her sitting and talking to people in deep conversations, more mature than she was at that point. I've always felt that the motherhood was intruding on me, so that was tough. But the actual looking after Candace was amazing.
- [04:35]
C
Was there anything in particular, or was it more a feeling you didn't feel as mothering?
- [04:39]
B
Well, my mother was a very practical cook, and she did everything beautifully, and so did my older sisters. Whereas I was a bit of a dreamer. Everything I cooked was either undone or burnt or something. Nothing really turned out for me. I blamed Cliff for everything. There was a kind of resentment that grew that he was able to follow his dreams, he was able to get his education, he was able to be pastoring and things like that. And I was left in the dust. So I think that all my life I was trying to forgive and come to terms with life.
- [05:10]
C
What did forgiveness mean to you then? And how did you kind of be at peace with the life you were having?
- [05:15]
B
Well, I think that I learned forgiveness from my father because it was something that did come from my Mennonite background. I remember the first time that I was introduced to the concept of being Mennonite. I had six cousins that were all Mennonite. We were just playing on these swings, and somebody came by and said, they're Just like the Mennonites, they're hogging the swings. And I said, I'm a Mennonite. I didn't realize I was a Mennonite. So I went to my father and I said, what is a Mennonite? And he says, it's a pacifist. I said, what is a pacifist? And he says, it's somebody that does not go to war and does not fight back and forgives. Well, that was then my definition of who I was as a Mennonite. And I thought, okay, then Mennonites are about not going to war. And I thought, that's a man's agenda. That isn't a woman's agenda. And after that, I had to understand, how does a woman forgive? How does a woman become a pacifist? I remember one day when I came home, there were policemen outside our garage. My father had a shell service station. He said somebody had come in and robbed him of cash. And so he had called the police. And so I just said, well, that isn't pacifism. You're calling in someone else to do your dirty work with guns.
- [06:30]
D
Do you remember how he defended himself?
- [06:32]
B
We argued about that all night. We went to bed, both of us very upset with each other. The next morning, he was at the bottom of the stairs when I came down from sleeping. And he said, you know what? I was wrong. You are right. I'm not totally a pure pacifist. There are some accommodations we have to make in life. I loved my father dearly after that for admitting that he was wrong.
- [06:56]
C
What do you remember from the 30th of November, 1984?
- [07:02]
B
Well, I remember I was up against a deadline that day, and I was frantic. Candice called me from school and asked me to pick her up, which I had intended to do. I said I was too busy. If she could just walk home that day. And it was a beautiful November day, just like this year. I was hoping that when she came home that it would all be done. All of a sudden I looked at the time and it was very quiet. I came up the upstairs and she wasn't home. Had that sinking feeling almost immediately that there was nothing that would have kept Candace from coming home from school that day.
- [07:37]
D
What was going through your mind at the time? Were you sort of assuming the worst?
- [07:41]
B
I think I almost assumed the worst right away is because she had been in such good spirits. She had just had a face wash with snow. Actually, she called me and she says, mom, I just had a face wash by David. And she was as High as a kite. Her best friend was coming in the next day on Saturday. So I knew nothing would keep her from coming home that day. In fact, she'd run all the way home. I knew it. So when she didn't come home, I just panicked. I had that sinking feeling almost immediately that something drastic had happened that would not let her come home. We packed up the kids and I picked up Cliff, and then he started to walk. We started to call. We just changed everything until we found her, but we just couldn't. Even though it had started off as a good and warm day, the blizzard happened around the time when she disappeared. So there was fresh snow and it was desolate. And as it was getting dark, it was getting dark soon.
- [08:36]
D
At what point did you call the police?
- [08:39]
B
We called them about 9 o' clock that night, and they came over. There were two officers that came in. And by this time I had all the pictures out of her and I had all the stories straight. And we just begged them. And they just looked at us. They just kind of examined us. And I think that they saw something so different than what we were trying to portray and very suspicious of us. And they didn't really believe us. They kept saying, she's a runaway. And we said, no, she isn't. Her best friend is coming in for the next day. She's not a runaway. And then they asked us about our lives, and Cliff told them that he'd been a pastor. We thought this was a good thing, that it was meant that we were good people. And then they said, well, maybe you're too religious.
- [09:21]
D
Did you feel infuriated?
- [09:23]
B
Oh, I was furious. I felt so insulted. I felt. Well. But more than that, I didn't care what they thought of me. I kept saying, it doesn't matter. I can be the worst parent in the world. Just go look for her, you know? It wasn't about being insulted at that point, but just desperate, absolutely desperate. We begged them and begged them, and finally they put it on citywide alert late that night. But they were really reluctant to do that. The city was falling asleep, and we knew that no one was looking for her anymore. Cliff went to bed that night and he was tired and I couldn't. I couldn't go to bed. I just stayed by the window and prayed until it got really, really cold. Then I thought, well, the only way to get warm, really, was to go and cuddle up with Cliff. So I went upstairs and cuddled up to him. And then I realized that all of a sudden that the wind in the House had stopped blowing and I didn't even know there was a wind. But all of a sudden, everything was quiet and still. And then I'm crying. Then I realized maybe that Candace had gone. Because my prayer that night to God was, you know, if need be, take Candace. Because she didn't like pain. I didn't want her to be held hostage for a long time. So I begged and bargained with my God. And so then I felt maybe she had died, maybe that was over. And I then said, candice, are you okay? And I heard a voice saying, yes, Mom. So that was kind of when I thought she had died. But I couldn't prove it, and I didn't want to prove it and I didn't want to believe me. Candace Dirksen was last seen around 4.
- [11:19]
D
O'Clock on Friday afternoon.
- [11:21]
B
We just want everybody to look for things, any clues, just to. Just to help us find her. Because, I mean, she's our daughter and we just want, if she is listening, we just want to tell her that we do love her.
- [11:36]
E
Police are worried about the length of.
- [11:38]
B
Time she has been missing. There's no indication that foul play is involved, but the length of time she has been away is concerning us. Most of the young children that go missing, her home for supper. The manager of this corner store a few blocks away remembered seeing her that afternoon. But her trail went cold after that. A search committee was formed and her classmates canvassed the neighborhood with posters. I hope that you guys can possibly find.
- [12:06]
D
Okay, thank you very much for your time.
- [12:11]
B
As Christmas approached, her family and friends took comfort in prayers for her safe return. There's still no word, and her disappearance is still a total mystery. I was very pleased with the attention we got. Our house became sort of a headquarters for all of the commotion that was happening. We had the psychics coming out and telling us their thoughts, and we had friends and prayers and prayer meetings. It had been seven weeks by this point, and we decided that even if Candace was dead or if she was kidnapped or whatever, we needed to continue. We had children and we had a life to support. So we decided that we were going to visit the police one more time. So we actually drove to the police station. But before we could lay out our suspicions, they kind of said, we need to talk to Cliff. And they put me in another room. And then Cliff came and talked to me and he said, you know what? They found Candace. And I said, this can't be. We're in the police station. They can't have found Candace. This is one of their Tricks. Sometimes they tricked people into talking. And so I didn't trust them. And then to realize that this time they found Candace. We went to the hospital to identify her body. And that was horrific because I remember walking into the room, she was so tiny. She was just so tiny. I thought she was always such a big personality. And here she was, so tiny. And the horror of what she had experienced was still written and etched on her face. And so we then cried, realized that she was really, truly gone, and went back home. There were people waiting for us at the house already. The media was there. We told them that we would have to have some time and that they'd have to wait for a few days. Our house was filled with people. They just came in and they just wrapped their arms around us as we grieved for Candice, that she would never come home. The relief that we'd found her, though, that we knew that she was okay, that she was in heaven. We comforted ourselves with those words. And the food just walked right through that door. There was Bush and Svaibach and Mennonite food, beautiful apple pie and cherry pies that were still warm. And so it was an up and down roller coaster of emotion to relief, to the grief. We could remember Candace the way she was. We didn't have to think that she was being assaulted or tortured or that kind of thing. We knew that she was okay. After a day of people just coming and going in our house, we were debriefing at the kitchen table when there was another knock on the door. And I just suspected that it would be somebody coming back for gloves or something they'd forgotten. But there was a stranger at the door. He was a tall man dressed in black. He introduced himself as a parent of a murdered child, too. And the word too sort of shocked me that now we're identifying with another people group, that we were parents of a murdered child. And then he said he'd come to tell us what to expect. So we invited him to the kitchen table and there we sat for two hours. He ate some of the pie, and he talked and talked and talked, and he told us that it had just destroyed his life. He told us about his daughter and the murder. And it was just a horrendous case that all of us knew about, and it had dominated the newspapers for a long time. So we recognized him from the media. He took out all the little black books that he was taking notes in about the trial and laid them all on the table. It really took a toll on him physically. He Was talking about his physical ailments. He took out all the pills and he laid them out on the table. He told us about how he was unable to concentrate, how he was unable to love his family, and how he was just consumed with anger and suspicion and just resentment. We just felt it. He just vibrated with the trauma. And then he said, I've even lost the memory of my daughter. I can't even remember her. Without thinking of all the trauma. He had every right to be angry. And actually, he did this a lot to a lot of the people that were experiencing trauma in the city. So that eventually the police even banned him from going to the people because they said that he was traumatizing the people. He had this mission in life to warn people that murder does traumatize, that it does take our lives away, and didn't have any solutions for it. He just wanted to tell us and to warn us. At one point, I remember looking at him and thinking, how can you do this to us? This is the worst thing that anybody could do to another person. Surely you know that you're traumatizing. We just couldn't stop paying attention to this wonderful man who was telling us and who cared, Even though his message was that of doom and gloom and desperation and eventual death. Like he really was saying that our lives were over. And I just was horrified. He left around 12 o' clock that night, and we sat in stunned silence for a while, and then we all went to bed. As we were just about to climb into bed, all of a sudden, Cliff and I stopped. We couldn't get into bed. There was something on our bed. It wasn't real, but it was imaginary, but it was a presence on our bed. We looked at each other and we both sensed that we didn't have the words for it. We were too stunned and too tired and too exhausted to even deal with this new thing. I've heard about this after. In many cases where the victims can't crawl into bed again and they will sleep in the living room. But we couldn't sleep in the living room. We couldn't sleep anywhere else. So we had to deal with this presence. And that's when Cliff and I just said, we'll forgive. And you know what? It was that simple word that actually removed the presence from the bed. It just hopped off. And so we actually climbed into bed after that and slept. And it was a miracle that we could actually do that. That was when we found out the real power of that word, that it can move trauma. It is a way of Us saying, no, we're not going to go that way. The trauma, I think, was the leftover presence of the man who'd come to visit us. And we said, no, we didn't want to go that way. We weren't going to follow his example of anger and hatred and all that. We were going to go another way. We didn't quite know what that all meant at that point. We didn't even know what forgiveness looked like in the face of murder and that kind of trauma. But we had just decided that we were going to forgive and we were going to move on. We lay down. I tried to close my eyes, and I opened them and I said, cliff, can you close your eyes? And he said, no, I can't. And I said, every time I close my eyes, I just see Candice's face, the horror still etched on her face, frozen there. And he said, me, too. I said, you know, let's think of scenes that we know where Candace was happy. Cliff was a photographer, so he had taken these beautiful videos of Candace running through leaves of her playing with kittens. We just started talking about all these scenes. And then slowly we fell asleep as we remembered her in happier times. And we actually slept that night. We woke up the next morning saying, we're going to forgive. We didn't know what that meant, but we were going to forgive. And that was the one word that we put all our hopes in, that this would bring us back to healing and normality.
- [19:54]
D
What did that mean?
- [19:56]
B
It's taken us a lifetime to realize what that meant. And the next day, when the media came to talk to us, we were prepared for them. We had made a statement of appreciation to the city of Winnipeg for their attention to us during this time. Then when the interview was over and I thought the reporters had laid down their pens, there was one reporter that said, what are you going to do about the murderer? And since we didn't know who had done it, we hadn't even considered it. We were just so happy that Candace had been found. And then we said, well, we chose the only word that we knew at that point that was going to help us. We said, oh, we're going to forgive. That became the main word the next day in the newspaper that we were going to forgive. I think it was so unusual that we, at that point in our lives, in that traumatic moment, had chosen to forgive. So there was this kind of backlash to the word forgiveness. And we had no defense at that point because we, too, were trying to find our way through it. And it Was difficult. I remember one time when I had a friend come over and she was coming over for tea and so we had a good time together. And then she said, wilma, what would it really take for there to be justice? So she actually asked the question. I said, you know what? It wouldn't be enough for that man to die because he was guilty of murder and Candace was innocent. So there was no equity. It wouldn't be enough for him to die. So I went down deep into my heartbroken mother's heart And I said, 10 child murderers would have to die for there to be justice. And even that wasn't good enough. And then I said, and I would have to pull the trigger. In my mind's eye, I pulled the trigger 10 times and saw 10 child murderers fall to the ground dead. And it felt delicious. And then I realized how that even though it did felt delicious, There was now 10 child murderers on the ground and there were 10 child murderer mothers. Now I had killed the sons of 10 mothers. And I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to perpetuate violence. I did not want to continue it. There's no way out of this except to forgive and move on. So I forgave and move on. Forgiveness is more about us than the perpetrators. It's more about us moving on and continuing to grab hold of life and letting go of all that resentment and bitterness and anger that just anchors us to that moment in time.
- [22:24]
C
So the word itself was almost like a balm for you and Cliff, as a way to process almost everything.
- [22:33]
B
Yes, there was just power in the word. It was like this word became symbolic to us, saying that we're going to leave this. We're not going to succumb to the trauma. We're not going to succumb to the fear and the anger at that moment, the survival instincts. We're going to move on to the higher we're going to go, to the common good of everybody. There's two ways we can survive. One is to fight and kill and be angry. The other is to let it go and embrace the moment. So there's a certain amount of mental gymnastics that has to happen. I'm going to accept the fact that God was near the shack and he didn't save Candace. I have to accept the losses. How do we create something new out of this? How do we engage our creativity and our imagination after we've forgiven, into creating something beautiful out of this? Frankly, I felt that Candace's assault would have been sexual. And so to me, the enemy was sex. So we abstained from sex. I couldn't have sex. And Cliff was. We had a good sex life, to tell you the truth. We didn't touch each other because I was upset. And so the very first thing that I realized was that we had to make peace with sex. And so I had to forgive sex. I had to forgive men. I had to forgive all of that. The first onslaught that we had to deal with forgiveness was to forgive ourselves.
- [24:01]
D
What did you have to forgive yourself for?
- [24:03]
B
I didn't pick Candace up. If I had picked up Candace that day, if I had done what I had promised her, then this all would have not happened. And I should have known that Candace be murdered. And so I just cried and cried and cried and realized I had to forgive myself. Starts with that.
- [24:22]
D
I can imagine a parent who's lost their kid hearing what you say and thinking to themselves, shit, I already had to go through the worst experience any parent could possibly imagine. And now I'm not living up to this impossible standard. Do you ever get responses like that? And what do you say to those people?
- [24:42]
B
It's never too late. It's never too late to step into the path of forgiveness. It's about the next moment, tomorrow. How am I going to live tomorrow?
- [24:53]
D
But surely there are people who can't, right?
- [24:56]
B
I don't know. I can't deal with that. If people don't want to forgive, I've tried to convince them it's a choice, and it's limited, if that's what you're asking. It's not something you can convince anybody about. We're helpless in the face of forgiveness as well. We can't force it on anyone, and we can't force anyone to accept it. And we just need to support everybody in their chosen paths.
- [25:21]
D
Does believing in heaven change the calculation for you? If you didn't believe in heaven, would you still be able to forgive?
- [25:28]
B
I think so, because I think forgiveness is a way of living here. It's a way of recycling life. I guess My spiritual belief is that God will enable us to recycle. He loves forgiveness, so he gives the power to that. But that's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about if something bad happens to us. Forgiveness is a way of creating a recycling can and recycling anything bad that happens to us into something good. But it is a matter of changing direction. It's a matter of letting go of our anger and our fears and all of our survival techniques and saying, okay, we're not going to Go that way, we're going to go another way. We're going to go the way of peace and love, and we're going to try and make something redeemable out of this mind. You believing in heaven helps. I believe very much that we need God in order to forgive. We need the higher power. We can't do it by ourselves. There has to be an admission of powerlessness and the relying of the Creator and God who knows the way through this. We need to first choose the Creator. That's the first choice. And then we choose forgiveness.
- [26:34]
D
Speaking as an atheist, I feel like I'd be remiss in my beliefs to not just push against the idea that it is necessary. I grew up without a religion, but I'm super on board with the idea of forgiveness for the most part, which is part of the reason I wanted to talk to you. Obviously, for a lot of people I think it can be helpful, but I don't think it's 100% necessary.
- [26:55]
B
Well, you know what? I had actually, I was in guitar giving this forgiveness talk, and I was told not to talk about my faith. So I was able to talk about forgiveness in a secular way. And then I had these three students come up to me after and says, do you really need a faith or not? I said, no, you don't, because even chimpanzees forgive. But I think that over time I realized that even chimpanzees are created to forgive and God is their part of that.
- [27:22]
D
Listening back to our last conversation, I noticed that there were a couple of times where I asked you sort of what forgiveness meant to you. You talked about it in very general terms, like it's been a process that you've been working your whole life trying to understand what it means, but then you didn't actually say what it means. So I'm just curious. Do you know what forgiveness means? I mean, could you, could you summarize it in a couple of sentences or is that impossible?
- [27:49]
B
Well, it is a process and it is a complicated process. And Jesus says It's not only seven times 70. It's 490 choices that we do make in order for us to accomplish forgiveness. It's a constant process that we need to emotionally go through as we do with the breathing and we do the heart beating and all that. Our spirits need to continue to forgive. I don't know if that. I don't know if that helps.
- [28:14]
D
I love everything you're saying. I feel like I need to point out that you didn't answer my question. You talked a lot about what forgiveness accomplishes. But what is forgiveness to you?
- [28:25]
B
Forgiveness is freedom. Forgiveness is joy. Forgiveness is love. I don't know.
- [28:34]
D
Is forgiveness the same thing as saying that something is okay?
- [28:38]
B
No. It can be. But the forgiveness that I believe in isn't just about pardoning. I remember when we came out with the word forgiveness and then people didn't want us to talk about because they felt that we were condoning murder. I think that forgiveness is a complicated way of addressing all of these issues to make them doable, rather than just a quick answer for it. What is forgiveness? Forgiveness is letting go of the natural impulses to take me the higher road. That didn't do it either, did it?
- [29:16]
D
No, no, keep going.
- [29:20]
B
Forgiveness. I don't know. It's a way of coping, right? I was dealt an impossible blow. I was told over and over again that forgiving a child's murderer that has been sexually assaulted is impossible to forgive. So forgiveness became our way of finding our way through an impossible situation and maintain her memory. Like Katniss isn't gone. Katniss is a way of continuing to keep her memory alive. If we hadn't forgiven, it would have been a way of letting her die in anger and bitterness and dysfunction.
- [29:55]
C
In this radio show I was listening to, there were all sorts of people who have been trying to forgive and some people saying that they can't forgive. And there was one man whose parents had been murdered in a really violent way by someone who was suffering from mental health issues. And the son said that he felt he could never forgive this person. And he clearly still holds a lot of anger, but he's saying he's using that anger and is now campaigning to change and improve mental health supports in the uk. And I just wondered whether you thought, is there ever a danger that forgiveness can lead to passivity?
- [30:32]
B
Oh, I think so. I think there's a false forgiveness that just appeases. There was a volunteer that came by very early, when we were still looking for Candice, and she noticed that there was something different about me. She says, what do you do? And I said, well, I'm a writer. And she says, yes. She says, that's what it is. She says, I know why God did this to you. You're going to write a book about all of this. I. Oh, I was furious. It was sort of like saying that I was then somehow responsible for my daughter's being killed, that God wanted me to create a book out of it. So I think that that kind of thinking is really not taking into consideration the Garden of Eden and the understanding that, no, this is a broken world. Forgiveness is a way of dealing with the brokenness, but not excusing it. We call things different words and we might use the anger to do things. But if he's moving towards something good with his anger, I would say that he is forgiving, that he's changing and he is making something good come out of evil. I would say that that's wonderful. The anger that destroys, that we need to forgive. The anger that keeps us going. That's good anger. That's good stuff. That's forgiven. Wilma and I have to admit that we had actually given up hope.
- [31:55]
E
We were already prepared to live with.
- [31:56]
B
This mystery that has shadowed our family for so many years. Now we have some answers and the promises of even more.
- [32:06]
C
In 2007, a man called Mark Grant was charged with Candace's murder. What, what was your reaction to that new development?
- [32:15]
B
When the police came to us and told us that they had perhaps found something, I avoided them. I didn't want to deal with it. We had already reached some kind of equilibrium, and I didn't want to know anything more about the case until they finally said, you know, we've got to meet. We've just got to meet. So we met. And it was horrendous. It was really tough. They had brought all of Candace's jean and all her effects into the courtroom. They were going through everything that she'd been wearing that day. I just felt the whole horror of that day again. And I was crying. And then I looked up and there he was looking at me. We locked eyes and that moment was just. I don't know, just. I felt vulnerable, exposed, and it was horrific.
- [33:06]
E
You could hear a pin drop in the courtroom as the jury delivered its verdict. Guilty of second degree murder, a punishment that carries with it a term of life in prison. After the judge left the court, Candice Dirksen's family stood and embraced. Some broke into tears. The Dirksen's then made their way from person to person, row after row, thanking supporters, wide smiles on their faces. Grant showed little emotion, but did shake his head as the jury was dismissed. Before this, the Dirksens have said the outcome wasn't important to them. That changed tonight.
- [33:40]
B
The way the story has come together has just completed us in a way I never expected.
- [33:46]
E
Tomorrow, the Dirksen's plan to lay white roses on their daughter's grave, a symbol of their new beginning.
- [33:52]
B
We're gonna move on. We're gonna go start something new. It's a New age, even at this age, that felt in some ways a kind of satisfaction. It really exposed and dragged everybody through a process that wasn't redeeming nor healing in the long run, except for the glimmers of truth that we did get out of it. We realized what had happened when it happened, what kind of person would have taken Candace. Some of it was horrible and horrifying, but it was still truth. We understood now everything that had happened. We also realized the extent of damage that happens to a person like this. Part of his story came out that he had also been kept in a shack for two or three days and isolated by his own father.
- [34:34]
C
Did you ever meet him? Was that something you wanted to do?
- [34:39]
B
I think ideally I would have liked to have a sit down conversation with him, but I don't think that it was possible to really have that kind of conversation with somebody who denied having done anything. You know, what would we get together and say? I would say, you did it and he would say, no, we didn't. That would be very unsatisfying. It would feel very cruel on my part to even accuse him. Almost exactly 32 years after the body of 13 year old Candice Dirksen was found, the man accused and convicted of her murder is getting a retrial. Mark Grant was found guilty of second.
- [35:13]
E
Degree murder in 24.
- [35:14]
B
After 10 years of being in custody for a crime he didn't commit. Mr. Grant is crying and grateful that the system has worked, that he's been found not guilty as we've always maintained from the beginning of this matter.
- [35:28]
C
Ten years after Mark Grant was imprisoned for Candice's murder, his case went to appeal and he was found not guilty. What was your reaction at that point?
- [35:41]
B
Relief. I'm hoping the crown doesn't appeal. In any case, we're out of here. You know, it's been 33 years and this just means it's over for us. The process is over and in that it's relief. Of course there was a bit of disappointment that it didn't arrive at the conclusion that we have personally arrived at. You know, that's going to be a little hard to come to grips with. Our job is just to live our lives in truth as best we can and enjoy what we've got, because we've got lots, you know, and, and remember that this doesn't change anything about Candace. It doesn't change at all. When he was convicted of second degree murder, I was then included on the prison system. I was then getting reports on what he was doing and things like that. And so in some ways there was a connection there. And I didn't like that. I didn't like being tied to him. So there was a kind of relief that we're not connected, we're going to go our separate ways.
- [36:46]
D
Do you believe that he did it?
- [36:48]
B
Yes, I do. He was living at the right place, he was out of prison at the right time. He had the right inclination.
- [36:54]
D
And yet you still felt relief when he won on appeal?
- [36:57]
B
Well, it's mixed, right? I was sorry that there was no justice. There is a kind of disappointment that justice doesn't happen, that we can't expect justice to happen in our world. So there is that disappointment. But there was a relief that I can just carry on. But then there's also this frustration that the truth will never be real, will never come out, and there's always a doubt. I love closures. I simply love a good closure in a movie, in a book, and anywhere in life. And then to realize I'd never have that, that was also something that I had to forgive. That my story doesn't end. It's a never ending story. I do have to tell a story about Candace. This is the best story about her. I remember when she was 12 years old and she was starting to babysit. And Candice was fearless. She could run miles. She was very fit physically. One day she called me from the babysitter's house and said she was afraid if I'd come over and be with her. I went over and everything was okay. And so I sat with her and I said, candice, why are you afraid? And she says, mom, I'm afraid I'm going to get murdered. And I said, why do you believe that? And she says, well, she had watched a movie and it was about murder. So she said, I'm just worried. And so I says, well, just ask God to help you and he'll protect you. And she looked at me with her big eyes. She said, mom, do you really believe that? I know that's not going to happen. God doesn't protect that way. And I said, well, you know, if we're taken prematurely by someone else, then God will make sure that our death has as much impact as our lives would. And she looked at me and there were big tears in her eyes and she nodded. And I could see the peace coming into her eyes. And I knew that she was giving her life and her death to God. And she wanted her life and her death to have an impact. And you know what? In that moment, she changed. And she was Never afraid Sam Sa Sam.
- [40:36]
A
That'S it for Love and Radio. This episode featured the voice of Wilma Dirksen and was produced by Katie Davis. Music on this episode came from Black Decelerant, Issac Carral, Flore Laurentienne, Glitch Bird, Emily Sprague, Syrinx Dialect, M. Sage, and Pauline Anastrom. Check the show notes for the full playlist. Love and Radio is a labor of Love and Radio and made possible thanks to our subscribers with extra special thanks to Ally Mothra, Perry Casey, Pamela Anderson, Chakrit Futudon, Sudha Chan, Chris Prude, Home Jacqueline Potato League, Jason V for Vendetta, Joe Palm, Harry Mark Dunks's son, Nick Grylls, Sam Hoffman, the Huffman Sindra Neck actually has to read the Schroeder, William, Stabby Spears and Khasani. If you want to join the group of wonderful human beings who make Love and Radio happen, you can help keep the show going by becoming a member yourself@loveandradio.org member or if you listen with Apple Podcasts, you can just subscribe right in the app. I'm Nicholas Sardine Punch Punch Van der Kolk. Thanks for listening.