Some time after 11 p.m. on December 3, 1981 a man phoned Barrel Taxi from the Continental Inn in Jasper Place and asked for a cab. Gerdina (Jeri) Kruidbos was dispatched to pick him up. Several minutes later the man phoned again for another cab, saying that when Ms Kruidbos drove up two other men got into her cab ahead of him and drove away. A short time later Barrel dispatcher Ruby Caron radioed a call for drivers near Castle Downs. Ms Kruidbos responded, saying she was at a store on 127th Street making change and picking up cigarettes and coffee for her fares, but that she would soon be available for the trip. Then Ms Caron heard a chilling appeal: "She kept saying, Ruby, I don't want to lose you. She said she was in trouble. Then the radio went dead and I couldn't call her any more. There was kind of a click and it was gone." Just before she lost contact Ms Caron heard Ms Kruidbos mumble something about "19th Street". The next morning, December 4, Anne Luc saw a Barrel cab parked behind her house. Her husband looked inside the cab that night after he got home from work. "He just came up running and looked really scared and he said 'oh my God, I think there's a body out there,'" and immediately called 911. Police found Ms Kruidbos on the back seat in a pool of blood under her head. She had been stabbed 17 times in the chest and both her lungs and heart were punctured. Seven of the wounds could have been fatal. The wounds were clustered on the right side of her chest, leading to speculation that her killer was left-handed. Ms Kruidbos had several defensive wounds on her hands and fingers. She had also been raped. The cab's meter was still running. The police investigation had little to go on and the case went cold. Nevertheless, a cigarette butt found in the cab and DNA evidence from the victim's body were both preserved and the investigation remained open. In 1989 Edmonton police carried out a review to determine if any new leads had emerged. In 1999 police were able to use the DNA retrieved from the cab in 1981 to create a profile of one of the attackers. In 2010 the profile was matched to a 50-year-old suspect. The suspect was in custody on burglary charges, but he had served 16 years for the attempted murder in 1984 of a 16-year-old girl. The girl was forced into a car at knifepoint and taken to a deserted field in east Edmonton where she was tied to a tree, sexually assaulted, stabbed 16 times in the neck and chest and left to die. The girl managed to untie herself and crawl to a nearby highway where a passing motorist spotted her. The suspect admitted being in the cab with Ms Kruidbos but claimed they had consensual sex and that the murder was carried out by the other man. The suspect claimed that he left the cab before Ms Kruidbos was attacked and walked to the home of a woman friend with whom he spent the night. The fact that the cab was parked only a seven minute walk from the woman's house suggested to police that the suspect himself had driven it there. In 2010 the suspect was charged with first degree murder, robbery, kidnapping, rape and possession of a dangerous weapon but the trial did not take place until May, 2012. Several of the original witnesses from 1981 testified at the trial, including former dispatcher Ruby Caron, Mrs. Luc and two retired police officers who were the first to investigate the murder scene. There was also a new witness. About two months after the murder an Edmonton woman told police that shortly after midnight on the morning of December 4 she saw a Barrel cab being driven erratically. She identified the suspect as the driver, with a second man in the passenger seat and "a person who seemed to be passed out in the back seat under a coat." The woman was going out for pizza and beer with her boyfriend and co-workers after finishing work at midnight. She said she "mouthed off" the driver through her passenger window because she was worried that the cab would hit her new truck. The suspect "got really mad" and threatened to kill the woman. [Next column]

Gerdina Kruidbos. (Source: Edmonton Police Service) The woman suffered nightmares but did not initially connect the incident with the Kruidbos murder. Then when the suspect was arrested in 2010 and his picture widely published, she recognized him as the man who threatened her. During cross examination, the suspect's lawyer pointed out discrepancies between her testimony and her initial statement to police, but she insisted that she was not mistaken. "I can certainly say it was him in the cab when he threatened to kill me," she said. In June, 2012, Justice Doreen Sulyma acquitted the suspect of all charges on grounds of reasonable doubt. She noted that two men were passengers in the cab and that the killer was left-handed while the suspect was right-handed. Justice Sulyma dismissed testimony of the woman who claimed to have seen the suspect driving the victim's cab on the grounds that her story changed over time and contained discrepancies. The suspect was set free. The justice also excluded evidence of the suspect's prior conviction for attempted murder. This became the chief grounds for an appeal by Crown prosecutor Susan Hughson who contended that Justice Sulyma failed to properly consider the suspect's previous criminal history. The appeal was rejected in February, 2013, when a three-judge panel of the Alberta Court of Appeal upheld the acquittal and refused to grant a new trial. Meanwhile, in October, 2012 police issued warrants against the suspect for ten counts of housebreaking and five counts of attempted housebreaking. In four of the incidents the suspect came face-to-face with witnesses and in one incident a homeowner was threatened with a knife. Police warned that the suspect was considered armed and dangerous and not to be approached. In September, 2014 the suspect pleaded guilty to two burglaries committed in May 2014 and was sentenced to three years in prison. He was subsequently charged with carrying out a break-in in November, 2013. In this case the homeowner showed police a half-eaten banana that the intruder left behind. The banana contained DNA belonging to the suspect. The suspect was sentenced to 18 months, to run concurrently with his earlier 3-year sentence. Police continue to look for the second suspect in the Kruidbos murder. Gerdina Kruidbos was 33 years old at the time of her death. Like Lucie Turmel, she came to Alberta from Montréal. She had owned her own cab for five years and was described as "an excellent driver, personality-wise. She handled people quite well. She preferred to drive nights. She liked the people and the work. She was more or less a night person." About 350 cab drivers attended the funeral. Her parents, brothers and sisters came to the funeral from Montréal, Miami and Calgary.