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UNSOLVED: Cindy James, Pt. 1

November 3, 2026 · 54 min

Show notes

In 1982, Cindy James was running a Vancouver treatment center for preschoolers with serious emotional and behavioral problems, and the two psychiatrists on staff reported to her. That October, months after leaving her sixteen-year marriage, the 38-year-old nurse called police to report obscene phone calls from a man who knew her name. She would call them close to a hundred more times over the next seven years. She hired a private detective she could not afford, moved six times, and legally changed her name. None of it stopped. On May 25th, 1989, Cindy deposited her paycheck at a Richmond bank machine and never made it home. In Part 1 of Murder: True Crime Stories, host Carter Roy traces the campaign of letters and fires that found her at every new address, the police officer who moved into her house twelve days after meeting her, and the doubt that crept into her case file until the people investigating her stopped believing her. Please note, this episode contains descriptions of sexual violence and discussion of suicidal ideation and may not be suitable for all audiences.

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