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SKS S4 Ep4: “D and L”

By David Ridgen

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[Crickets chirping and footsteps]

VOICE 1: On March 20^th…

VOICE 2: Run!

[Heavy breathing and running]

VOICE 1: ..only one movie experience this year will make you afraid to breathe.

VOICE 3: You won’t survive.

VOICE 2: We have to try.

VOICE 1: A Quiet Place: Part II. In theatres March 20^th. Tickets on sale now.

[Music]

ANNOUNCER: This is a CBC original podcast.

[Phone ringing]

ED JR: Hello.

RIDGEN: Hey, is Ed there?

ED JR: That’s me.

RIDGEN: Hey, Ed. It’s Dave Ridgen calling from CBC.

ED JR: Hey, how you doing?

RIDGEN: I’m good. Is this a good time?

ED JR: Yeah. No worries, man.

RIDGEN: After receiving Ed Galick Jr.’s Facebook message, I arranged to speak over the phone. Ed Jr. lives in Western Canada so it will take some more planning to actually get him in person. But having him on the line was a good opportunity to ask a few preliminary questions.

I think you probably knew Wayne pretty well, right?

ED JR: I knew him very well. I grew up with him, right? He was like my dad’s son at that point. With my dad’s relationship with Wayne, that was his son. You know what I mean? He was my boss for a very long time. But I mean SERGE was a family back then. It was all uncles and brothers and, you know, these guys always out drinking together and partying. I mean, you couldn’t separate those guys.

RIDGEN: I ask Ed Jr. for his thoughts on Wayne’s murder.

ED JR: Honestly, when that happened, I was shocked. I was shocked because I didn’t know Wayne all that well then. We had been disconnected for a while because you got to understand, when that was going on, I had left SERGE. I did. I had started my own business at the time. I’d left my dad as well. That’s some years after Wayne left. He’d been in his own business. I knew--because you hear in the industry right, ‘cause we all know people-- and I knew that they got that new place there and they were trying to get into spring water and I knew he was in the machinery business because I knew they were doing work ‘cause we’d run into each other, that type of thing. And, you know, I’d driven by the house. I thought “Wow, that’s a pretty neat place.” And then when that happened, I was blown away.

RIDGEN: Ed Jr. speaks quickly and with a bluntness that reminds me of his father. Both of the Eds were considered persons of interest by the police.

ED JR: I got questioned by the police. They came to my place. They wanted hair samples of this. Holy fuck, man…

RIDGEN: How many times did they question you and how much depth?

ED JR: Twice. Not very deep because I told them “Buddy, listen. Get out of here, man. If you’re knocking on my door, you guys are way off base”. [Laughing] Like, you know what I mean? I said, “You guys are coming here, you’re way off base.” ‘Cause I hadn’t been in that circle for years at that point. You know? I barely even knew where Wayne lived at that point.

RIDGEN: Do you have any interest in coming on camera?

ED JR: Sure, man. I mean, I don’t know what I can help towards this. I gotta tell you though man. I can’t believe nothing’s been done, you know?

[Theme music plays]

ANGELINE: You are listening to Someone Knows Something from CBC Original Podcasts. In Season 4, David Ridgen continues the work he started nine years ago on the Wayne Greavette case. This is Episode 4: D and L.

[Music]

[Rain pattering on roof]

DIANE: Oh my. Look at it out there. So David… [Laughs]

RIDGEN: How you doing?

DIANE: I’m good. Wow, what a nasty day though. It was quite the ride up here.

RIDGEN: So what I’d like to do is to drive-- just drive by. Like, a couple of times. You can drive standard, eh?

DIANE: Yeah, oh. I can’t drive standard. Well, maybe. Do we gotta go on the highway?

RIDGEN: Not very far.

DIANE: No? [Laughs] You’re taking a real chance with me. I gotta move this seat thing here.

RIDGEN: Here, here, here.

DIANE: Ok. So there’s that. Here’s the clutch.

RIDGEN: Here’s the key.

DIANE: Oh, you’re taking a real chance. Here’s my second, straight down.

RIDGEN: Yeah.

After speaking to little Ed on the phone and making plans for a more formal interview with him, Diane and I search for old friends and acquaintances who might be able to help with Wayne’s case.

Stay over to the left here a bit.

Recording audio and driving manual is difficult, so Diane has offered to take the wheel.

Okay, now you’re gonna kind of keep going straight onto that road.

DIANE: Okay. Go straight up, don’t make the, uh--

RIDGEN: That’s right, keep going straight. And then the train track is brutal so you gotta really go slow and you go right into first. You’re doing great!

DIANE: Oh, yeah.

RIDGEN: Seasoned professional.

DIANE: Seasoned professional, eh?

RIDGEN: Yeah.

DIANE: Am I going too fast?

RIDGEN: Not yet.

At the moment, Diane and I are out looking for a man named Richard Lepp.

DIANE: Richard Lepp was a friend but a trucker, and he used to truck a lot of stuff around for us. Like, machinery and equipment. And he was over at our house lots. Um, you know, he’d go and have beers with the guys, like, Ed and Wayne and the whole gang from SERGE. They’d all go drinking, and, uh--

RIDGEN: So you think Richard is-- again, he’s another one of these guys who might know something?

[Music]

RIDGEN: Richard is mentioned by several people we’ve spoken to as someone I should talk to. Lepp was never at the farm, according to Diane, but some have said he bears a resemblance to one of the sketches of the two men asking for Wayne’s address at the Acton post office. But that doesn’t mean much, if anything. Many people I’ve spoken to have different opinions of who the sketches may look like.

[Music]

DIANE: He was from a Mennonite family or he was raised by a Mennonite family.

RIDGEN: Richard Lepp?

DIANE: Yep. I haven’t talked to any of these people since it happened, ‘cause, you know, I don’t wanna call them. I don’t want anyone to know where I live or nothing about me, man. Like, I can’t keep going on this long. There’s no closure. A lot of times I think about everything that the police have checked into and we’re probably talking to some people that may have already talked to 100 times and I ask myself, “Well, what more would we get out of them than maybe the police already got?” Right? But it’s that many years later than maybe just something comes up, you know?

RIDGEN: Diane and I couldn’t find Richard Lepp but I kept trying. Recently I was able to find an address for Lepp but the fresh untracked snow surrounding the place every time I visit suggests no one actually lives here.

[Music]

RIDGEN: It’s mid-December. Lots of snow on the ground. It’s 2017, a week before Christmas. I’ve come down to the same Southern Ontario town where I was looking for Richard Lepp before. He worked in the beverage and packaging industry. Knew Wayne and some people have said that he may have something to say or… Now, he’s the house and it didn’t appear that anyone was living there last time I was here. And that looks like the case now.

[Music]

RIDGEN: I don’t see any footsteps in the snow.

[Car beeping]

[Car door closes]

[Footsteps in the snow]

[Knocks on door]

RIDGEN: There’s a package delivery slip here for Richard Lepp.

[Knocks on door]

RIDGEN: Hmm. Doesn’t seem to be answering the door. There’s no footsteps except for mine leading up here.

I don’t think Richard Lepp’s living here but his mail goes here. So I sent him a courier letter but have yet to receive a response. I’m hopeful that the podcast of this case will reach the right set of ears. If you know anything about Wayne or his case, please get in touch.

[Car door closes]

RIDGEN: I’ll keep loooking for Richard Lepp. Luckily there are others to find and speak to, like the two SERGE employees mentioned by name in the letter. “You did some work for a company I was with a few years ago and although you won't remember me, Lisa and your delivery man Joe most likely will”. Police believe that the letter writer named two people Wayne knew to lull him into a false sense of security. But if the murderer knew of Joe and Leesa, was the reverse also true? Did they know of the murderer?

And then Joe-- do you remember Joe’s last name?

DIANE: Yeah, Zot-- Zotich.

RIDGEN: That’s a pretty easy name to find though.

DIANE: Yeah.

RIDGEN: Probably not very many Zotiches around.

DIANE: No, really.

RIDGEN: Joe’s given name, I discover later, is actually Giusseppe, but everyone calls him Joe.

Zottich, okay. Where did he-- he used to live on that fish farm property?

DIANE: Yeah.

RIDGEN: And then he moved somewhere?

DIANE: I don’t know where he lived. The last time I knew he was on the fish property.

RIDGEN: There was a fish farm next door to the Greavette’s farmhouse where Joe happened to live in a trailer.

And did he live on the fish farm property before you moved there?

DIANE: Yep.

RIDGEN: That’s interesting. Did he never tell you about the spring property? Did he ever tell you before you saw the ad or anything?

DIANE: No. I was only just going through the papers, sitting at the house and asking, and I happened to see it and thought, “Hey, there’s a great thing.” I mean, being that we were all involved in it, right?

RIDGEN: It’s really interesting, and it’s very coincidental that he lived there, right? And he was also one of these guys mentioned in the note. I think that’s just so weird.

Police say that it was just a coincidence that Joe lived so close and was also mentioned in the letter and that there was nothing untoward about it.

DIANE: Yeah, that he had a trailer and that there and-- no, but he didn’t tell us about the property at all. But it is weird that they would mention Joe but there again he worked for SERGE and he worked for D&L, so, you know.

RIDGEN: And it wasn’t hard to get a delivery guy’s name, right?

DIANE: Yeah, really. Well, that’s, you know, it’s hard to say but he was a great guy. He was a driver and he would get our stuff to the places and, you know, he was a good man and I hope he’s well.

RIDGEN: Joe’s been a tough one to find so if anyone in the audience remembers or knows Guiseppe “Joe” Zot-teach, or Zottich, please write us at SKS. And then there’s Leesa - who spells her name L E E S A - differently than how it appeared in the letter - L I S A. Leesa worked for Wayne and Ed at SERGE and became close with Diane.

DIANE: Her and I got to be friends and then she started coming over lots and then we would always go every year for a girls weekend where a bunch of us girls would go away and she was my very close friend at that time. We did everything together

RIDGEN: In fact, when the Greavette’s began their own company, it was called D&L Equipment Locators — D for Diane and L for Leesa.

DIANE: And was called D and L for her to come and be a part of this company. Because she was my best friend. And I figured we'd all do it together like when Wayne got let go from Serge after whatever happened over there. You know? I went out that week, got the company registered, and did it in D&L.

RIDGEN: But after Wayne’s murder, and the subsequent police investigation, Diane discovered that there was more to Wayne and Leesa’s relationship.

DIANE: I don't like talking about that. It just goes to show you, you don't know people do you eh?

RIDGEN: Wayne, it turns out, had had an affair with Leesa for years.

DIANE: I just was really disappointed to find out, apparently I guess that she had been messing with Wayne since she started at SERGE in Milton. From what I understand and then I guess she carried it on when we were in Acton. She spent a lot of time at the house. She was always at the house. I started getting a little pissed off with Wayne because it was flirtatiousness with her and so then Wayne and I started to argue a little bit in regards to it. I just wasn't liking how things looked and, you know, he just thought it was just, you know, like I was wasting his time over something trivial, you know. Like, so stupid, right?

RIDGEN: And police discovered that Leesa wasn’t the only woman who Wayne had pursued while he was married to Diane.

DIANE: I mean, I knew him since I was fifteen. Like, twenty three years we were together. And by the sounds of it to me from the police-- he was a very active man out there with a lot of other women. So I just like... and where he found the time to do it for Christ's sake. Like, at first I was like I was devastated. I actually I felt like a real twit to be honest with you. Like how could, you know, all that go on and me not know? And then you find out all these things and you think that you knew somebody so well and yet you didn't know them really. Sometimes he wouldn’t come home and some nights he didn't come home and it would be the next morning he would walk through the door. And his excuse would be that he had too much to drink and stayed over at someone's place. A lot of times there, I questioned that. You know, I thought maybe he was messing around. And he said, to me “Diane, why would I take that chance?” He said, “I got you and the kids. Do you really think I would give this up just for being with another woman?” I don't understand this other life that he had. Like, each time the police will call me and say “Well do you know this girl or do you know this girl in Brantford” and, you know, Wayne had a thing going with her and one time there, you know, the police had said to me, they had called me in regards to this girl in Brantford and apparently Wayne had stayed there for a couple weeks. And what I was told was that he confided in her that he had a problem. And so now I'm in there digging. “Well, what do you mean?” Like, you mean he told her he wouldn't tell me his own wife? Like, I came home from the police station and, you know, I was bawling my eyes out and I phoned my girlfriend and I phoned any girl I knew because I wanted to find out who else did he have-- it was almost like he was like a predator. He was predating all my girlfriends. So I phoned my girlfriend. I said, I just come back from the police station and I told her about Leesa and I said, “I got to ask you” I said, “Did he come on to you too?” And she didn't say anything for a minute and then I said, “Like did he come on to you too?” And she said, “Diane I don't want to talk about it on the phone.” She said, I think, you know, I'll grab her husband and we'll come up together. And she said, “but I'll have to explain it to him first.” So they came up. Both of them. And what she told me was that she was lying in bed and Wayne had come in there and crawled in beside her and started to neck with her. And then she realized it was Wayne and told him to get the hell out of her whatever. That’s all she said. I don’t know if it ever went further than that.

RIDGEN: Could Wayne’s affairs have had something to do with his murder?

DIANE: I kept thinking that-- we thinking it's all the springs and everything but then I also think that maybe it's the part where there's a jealous husband and the husband found out that Wayne's been after these girls and I talked with the police and that about it because I said, like maybe if, he's excuse my phrase, fucked that many girls... And one of the husbands found out, um… My life was Wayne. I loved him. And you know what, sometimes he wasn't a really nice guy. Sometimes he was, you know, very-- he was very dominating and he controlled my life and he pretty well told me what I could do, and what I couldn't do. But he was a good father, and he was a good husband and, I looked up to him so much. Like, he was just so smart. ‘Cause we were a team, and that's how I looked at it always, we were a team. I went through a really bad depression there and I'm working on it. I just thought that maybe I was such a bad wife and everything else… why Wayne would have to go out and do all this stuff? And blame myself for it. I took it real personal for a while because I just didn't understand it, you know? In the end, so mad at Wayne. I'm not feeling sorry for myself or nothing. I've said, I had a life and it was taken away, you know? And even if it was miserable sometimes, it was my life and my choice to be there, and somebody took that choice away from me. They, uh, they took it away from all of us, really.

[Music]

RIDGEN: You just talked me for I don't know how many, twenty, thirty minutes about your husband Wayne, about how has gone with different women and how you kinda learned to be angry against him. You had no idea this investigation brought up all this stuff. You have no idea. Why are you so interested in finding out who killed him?

DIANE: I'm not feeling sorry for myself or nothing just..I've said, I had a life and it was taken away, you know? And even if it was miserable sometimes, it was my life and my choice to be there, you know, and somebody took that choice away from me. They, took it away from all of us really.

RIDGEN: The news of Wayne’s affairs, though difficult to hear, hasn’t deterred the family’s search for the truth behind his murder. Danielle questioned Detective Constable Paul Johnson about this area of the investigation.

DANIELLE: Do you find that that’s the area that you had the least amount of information on, is his affairs?

PAUL JOHNSON: Yes. We’ve got-- we’ve got bankers boxes full of business records and we know people he did business with. If it was business-related then we have the files. We can look. We can go up to these people. The private side of his life, the side of his life that he kept to himself, we don’t know. We don’t have any information on.

DANIELLE: But obviously you guys would have names because obviously, you know that he had affairs. So you would know that somehow by people who have come forward and said that they’ve had affairs with him.

PAUL: We have talked to some but there's the potential for there to be more. And if that's the case then what we're hoping for is for someone to come forward.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

RIDGEN: And someone needs to come forward, even if confidentially. Police say they investigated all the affairs they knew of to no avail. But maybe there is one out there they didn’t know about.

[[Crickets chirping and footsteps]

VOICE 1: On March 20^th…

VOICE 2: Run!

[Heavy breathing and running]

VOICE 1: ..only one movie experience this year will make you afraid to breathe.

VOICE 3: You won’t survive.

VOICE 2: We have to try.

VOICE 1: A Quiet Place: Part II. In theatres March 20^th. Tickets on sale now.

[Music]

RIDGEN: Keep going. It’s past this bunch of shrubbery and stuff.

Danielle and Justin decide to visit Leesa to talk for the first time about the case and about her affair with their father.

You think front or side door?

[Knocks on door]

[Doorbell rings]

[Door opens]

LEESA: Hi!

DANIELLE: Hello!

LEESA: Hello.

DANIELLE: Do you remember me?

LEESA: No

DANIELLE: It’s Danielle. Greavette.

LEESA: Oh my goodness!

[Laughter]

LEESA: Look at you guys. Oh my god, you’re grown up!

JUSTIN: Haha! How’s it going?

LEESA: You knew I was here?

JUSTIN: Well we figured. So…

LEESA: Wow!

DANIELLE: We didn’t know if we would talk to you.

LEESA: Want to come in?

DANIELLE: This is David, actually, from CBC.

RIDGEN: Hi, how you doing?

Leesa is shorter with curly blonde hair, a sleeveless dark shirt and hooped earrings and perfectly manicured nails. She invites us into her kitchen for a chat.

DANIELLE: What would be-- like, if you were to speculate, what would be the direction would you say that we should take?

LEESA: I don’t want to say it, but like I’m scared about saying the drug part because all we smoked was dope, like pot, but you might have to go anyways. ‘Cause I thought at one point maybe Richard had something because he was the driver and I don’t know about that, right?

JUSTIN: Richard…?

LEESA: Richard that was from Saint Catharines.

JUSTIN: Richard Lepp? Yeah, okay.

LEESA: Yeah. I thought maybe, right?

RIDGEN: Richard Lepp, the man Diane and I were already looking for comes up again. A friend and coworker of Wayne’s, someone to try talking to. And Justin asks about another name that has also come up. Ed Galick Jr, also know as little Ed or Eddie.

JUSTIN: Can I ask what about little Ed and my dad’s relationship?

LEESA: Bad, very bad, very, very bad.

JUSTIN: Like, how bad?

LEESA: Very bad. Very bad. So Wayne and Eddie just didn’t work together. They fought a lot on the quotes and pricing. And Wayne wanted it run a certain way, and Eddie just did it his way.

JUSTIN: Where there any major confrontations between the two?

LEESA: Um, yep, yup!

JUSTIN: Physical?

LEESA: No, no physical. There was never any physical. But they had good fights in that building, yeah. And I do know that when Ed came back, Wayne-- it didn’t matter about Wayne anymore. Ed took over the back, yeah. He got right involved back again when he came back. Especially the last time when things started to get going and shuffling, you could feel the tension.

RIDGEN: Justin and Danielle ask about the off behaviour that Ed Sr said he witnessed in Wayne and how Wayne seemed to change at work.

JUSTIN: Did he kind of go into the same habits he did while he was at SERGE?

LEESA: Oh yeah, he got lazy. I found that your dad got lazy, just lazy. Didn’t want to push anymore.

DANIELLE: Now he was having trouble answering the phones, he didn’t want to answer them, and that goes with the laziness right?

LEESA: Oh yeah.

DANIELLE: But, you know, was there people calling that were angry to you?

LEESA: Oh yeah. Yeah.

DANIELLE: What were they angry about?

LEESA: Because he wouldn’t return his calls. He was always out.

JUSTIN: Would he take money first before doing the jobs?

LEESA: We were on the 50-40-10.

[Phone rings in background]

RIDGEN: 50-40-10, meaning that D&L would ask for fifty percent of payment up front before a job commenced, then forty percent upon delivery, then the final ten percent 30 days later. Ed Gallick said that in some cases, Wayne would take that fifty percent payment and not complete the job.

JUSTIN: So he would take 50 and then just not deliver?

LEESA: Yeah. And then--

JUSTIN: Did he just seem like he gave up?

LEESA: Yeah he gave up. Your dad gave up.

DANIELLE: Did dad steal money?

LEESA: I can’t say no. He did sell things and pocket it, yes.

JUSTIN: Well, that we’ve heard.

DANIELLE: Yes.

LEESA: But he wouldn’t have brought it there. He would have done it on the side.

DANIELLE: So through SERGE or--

JUSTIN: Through S.E.R.G.E or D&L?

LEESA: No, it wasn’t D&L. It would be on his own. Like he would just do cash on the table, and that would be it.

JUSTIN: OK.

LEESA: Now, I don’t know who, but yeah, he did do deals under the table.

DANIELLE: What kinds of amounts would we be talking about?

LEESA: I would only do like-- I would say, like, I don’t really know, but I know like maybe $5,000. It wasn’t big, huge amounts. Cause your dad wasn’t greedy, eh? He just wanted money for the family and basically that was about it.

[Music]

DANIELLE: Did he confide in you at all? You were kind of a best friend on the side, maybe some things he didn’t want to tell his wife?

LEESA: No. We didn’t really talk about things like that. You know, like, he was always doing business. I mean, yes, he would pick me up and we’d go to some place. He would drop me off and pick me back up so that I wouldn’t be seen. Or we’d do night things and go to like a place that was broken down. So… see, I thought about it too you guys and see, it’s unfortunate because I broke away from them, right? So whatever they did after I had broken my wings from them, I lost that, I don’t know, year and a half, two years, right?

JUSTIN: How did you find out?

LEESA: The newspaper and when I came home there was a Sergeant Detective card on my front door

JUSTIN: Oh really?

LEESA: I didn’t know anything about it, I was at a skating competition in Acton, walked up my front door to a police card, didn’t know what was going on, walked in the house. Shocked. Shocked.

JUSTIN: What was your experience like with the cops?

LEESA: Oh, very intense. Extremely intense. Because I apparently-- like, I, what was I? Rocky was the jealous boyfriend, I was the jealous girlfriend. That’s what it came out as.

RIDGEN: Rocky, a trucker, had also been seeing Leesa.

LEESA: But by then I was with Rocky and I had burnt strings from your parents, so whatever they did, like, that’s totally up to them. I, you know…

RIDGEN: Are you still in touch with that Rocky guy? Do you have any knowledge of where he might be? I’d be interested in talking to him. He’s a trucker, right? Long distance, cross country?

LEESA: Uh, yeah he was.

JUSTIN: Do you-- what do you think?

LEESA: Rocky?

JUSTIN: Yeah.

LEESA: No.

JUSTIN: No? What makes you say no?

LEESA: Well, why would he leave me with an eight-page letter saying that he’s having an affair with a lady down the street?

[Music]

RIDGEN: Why would Rocky be jealous of Wayne, Leesa reasoned, if Rocky was also seeing somebody on the side.

JUSTIN: Did they grill you pretty hard?

LEESA: Oh my god, yes.

JUSTIN: Did you take a lie detector test?

LEESA: Uh, no I didn’t.

JUSTIN: Did they ask you to?

LEESA: Uh, yep.

JUSTIN: And you said no?

LEESA: Yeah, I said yeah, of course.

JUSTIN: Oh you would?

LEESA: Oh absolutely! There’d be no reason why I wouldn’t, why wouldn’t I?

JUSTIN: No I’m just curious

LEESA: They pulled hair out of my head.

JUSTIN: Oh they did?

LEESA: For DNA.

RIDGEN: Leesa also says they took Rocky’s DNA by plucking his hair. Justin turns the conversation back to Wayne.

JUSTIN: Did he ever write you letters or anything?

LEESA: Lots.

JUSTIN: Do you have them?

LEESA: I will look.

DANIELLE: Try.

JUSTIN: Please.

LEESA: Oh, yeah. I got letters, oh yeah.

JUSTIN: Okay. We would love to take a look at them.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

JUSTIN: And there’s gonna be letters when you find them that you’re gonna say, “You know what? It’s gonna hurt the kids if they see this--"

DANIELLE: Don’t worry about that.

LEESA: Well it doesn’t matter, right?

JUSTIN: Not knowing hurts a heck of a lot more.

DANIELLE: We are well aware of it.

LEESA: I realize how-- how I felt knowing that your dad was gone and how you guys must've felt that I was his mistress. I feel like this big. I thought that secret would never ever ever come about. I’m sorry. It happened.

DANIELLE: Yeah.

LEESA: But I'm quite sure, as, you know, I'm not the only one. It's a path.

JUSTIN: Yeah. Absolutely not. Absolutely not.

LEESA: You just break it off and he moved onto somebody else.

RIDGEN: Leesa is open and helpful, even though in the wake of Wayne’s murder she was and remains frightened. Her name was in the letter.

LEESA: And then finally I got over D&L.

RIDGEN: As we continue talking, Leesa remembers something else.

LEESA: You know what, you guys? If I look in my-- I will get it out this weekend, in my computer I have that old 286. I don’t know if you remember--

JUSTIN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. LEESA: Yeah. And to be honest, remember Dean? Remember my boyfriend Dean?

DIANE: Yeah.

LEESA: He made me break off with him. New Year’s Eve. When I went up to Ed and Alfrun’s. Wayne was so mad. And then every time Dean came over I’d have to hide the car in the garage, and yeah, ‘cause he was going to fire me, oh yeah. And I needed that job.

RIDGEN: Leesa says that Wayne was angry that she was also seeing a man named Dean and that Wayne wanted her to break up with Dean or Wayne would fire her. Leesa says because she needed the job she complied and broke up with Dean.

LEESA: I dumped him on the phone and that was it, never saw him again. Never called him, never saw him, nothing. Never ever again.

DIANE: And Wayne made you do that?

LEESA: Yep. Yep. Yep. Oh yeah.

RIDGEN: Leesa says she finally broke things off with Wayne, but not until she had already left D&L. According to Leesa, Wayne didn’t take it very well.

LEESA: Oh, he was mad.

DIANE: Was he?

LEESA: Yeah and he kept phoning, I wouldn’t answer the phone, he kept knocking, I wouldn’t answer the door. Oh, he was not happy. No.

DIANE: And how long would that have been before he passed away, do you think? That you broke it off with him?

DIANE: Yeah.

LEESA: Because I got laid off.

DIANE: Yeah.

LEESA: And it was like then when I said, this is enough. Like, I have to move on with my life.

DIANE: Yeah.

LEESA: And I had said that to him, it’s over. I can’t do this anymore. No. ‘Cause-- No. No, no. So I would say May-ish? June-ish?

DIANE: Of 96?

RIDGEN: Leesa says she ended her relationship with D&L and following that, with Wayne, around May or June of 1993 or 1994. But they sporadically kept in touch and Leesa even visited the farm property once in 1996. Diane continues talking about Wayne’s behaviour around the time of the farm purchase after moving in.

DIANE: And I know that when we bought the farm, Wayne had been quite depressed prior to that. And miserable. He wasn’t very happy, you know? And then, when I had found the springs and presented him with it, first he had no interest. And then I got him and ma to go for a drive and go over there and take a look at it. And then, you know, he was all keyed up again…

RIDGEN: Diane didn’t learn about Wayne’s relationship with Leesa until after the murder investigation began, in the wake of Wayne’s December 1996 murder.

DIANE: The chances of the two of us ever getting together-- back then I could have choked you, you know?

LEESA: Absolutely.

DIANE: Here we are being able to sit on the same couch and talk about a man that we very much cared for. Which obviously, you did too.

LEESA: But I also wanted to break things off, many, many, times. Many, many. And he wouldn’t let me.

DIANE: What do you mean he wouldn’t let you? Like--

LEESA: He just kept coming over, and kept coming over.

DIANE: Did he ever get physical with you?

LEESA: No, never.

RIDGEN: Was he known Leesa to be volatile like that?

LEESA: No.

RIDGEN: At any time in his life?

LEESA: No, he was not a violent man.

DIANE: No, no. That’s not necessary; you knew how he treated me sometimes.

LEESA: Well, yeah, but he wasn’t violent. Like, he never hit or--

DIANE: He hit, but he didn’t leave marks or stuff like that, you know. I mean, I got a good few shots, man. You didn’t know that?

LEESA: No.

DIANE: Oh, Jesus man, yeah. I got thrown out of the house. I got so many things. But, you know what, it was just, he was the only man I ever knew; I loved him, you know? He was my everything, and yeah I got smucked a couple of times.

LEESA: No, I didn’t know that.

DIANE: Yeah.

DIANE: It’s in the past now. I only want closure for me and my kids. I don’t give a shit anymore because I’ve heard so much about all his relationships. It is not a big deal anymore. It-- it hurt me big time. But right now I just want closure. I want to move on, and so do the kids. And we need help.

[Music]

DIANE: Bye.

[Diane chuckles]

DIANE: Thank you for letting us come in and talk, okay?

LEESA: Yeah.

[Music]

RIDGEN: Diane’s visit with Leesa comes to an end and as we drive away, it’s clear how hard it has been on her.

DIANE: I’m thinking that I’m really… I don’t really have anything to say right now. You know-- [Tearfully] I didn’t-- really, I don’t know how I feel. I just, um… [Sighs]

RIDGEN: We drive to Diane’s home in silence.

[Music]

RIDGEN: Investigations like this one bring forward information that can’t be unknown. Pictures in your head that you cannot unsee, revelations about people you thought you knew that forever change you. And it’s through this process that cases much be approach by family members, like willfully walking through an unmarked minefield. The Greavettes keep moving forward, but stepping carefully. And I can see that part of the reason is that they need to do this. It’s as much about freeing themselves as it is about anything for Wayne.

[Music]

[Theme music plays]

ANGELINE: You have been listening to Episode 4: D&L. Visit cbc.ca/sks to see crime scene photos and to find out how to submit a tip to the podcast. You can also join our listener community on Facebook and Twitter and be the first to hear about new content. Someone Knows Something is a proud part of CBC Original Podcasts. If you’re looking for more great podcasts in other styles and genres, check out Alone: A Love Story. Alone is a memoir by Michelle Parise who takes you on a journey from new love, marriage and baby to betrayal and loneliness. Subscribe in Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to SKS. Someone Knows Something is hosted, written and produced by David Ridgen. The series is mixed by Cesil Fernandes and produced by Chris Oke, Steph Kampf, Amil Delic, Eunice Kim and Executive Producer Arif Noorani. Our theme song is “Higher” by Olenka Krakus.

[Singing]

Olenka Krakus: Baby, oh, baby.

Where shall we go?

In my dreams there’s a mountain and desert below.

DIANE: Ok, we’re ready. Well, be interesting to see what these guys find on this computer.

JUSTIN: All dad’s evidence is in here, right?

DIANE: I’ll get the monitor here. Ah, got it!

[Heels clicking on floor]

[Bell dings]

DIANE: Hi! We’re here to see Paul Johnson.

[Heavy door unlocks]

DIANE: Hi, Paul.

PAUL: Hi. Come on in.

[Diane exhales heavily]

[Heels clicking]

DIANE: Everything on Leesa’s computer here.

PAUL: And this is the computer she used back during the time that she was working with you on D&L?

DIANE: Yeah.

PAUL: Okay.

DIANE: Will they be able to dig in there and find out, like, when she was last on it and--

PAUL: Oh, yeah. Just do the proper reports and Bob’s your uncle.

[Car door closes]

[Music]

ANNOUNCER: For more CBC original podcasts, go to cbc.ca/originalpodcasts.

TRANSCRIPT: Someone Knows Something - Season 4, EP 4

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