How Four Days Of Terror Unfolded On The James Smith Cree Nation Where Everyone Lost Someone

Daryl Burns sat in the warmth of a sacred fire on a blistering September day. The fire had been lit to mark the death of his sister, Gloria Burns, and as the flames danced in the sun, talk turned to her killer. “He’s at peace now,” Daryl said. “It’s going to be passed down to the ancestors. He’s not going to feel that pain, hurt, anger anymore.” Daryl is an elder in the James Smith Cree Nation. When he speaks, everyone listens. The group of mourners gathered around the fire fell silent. Geese honked overhead and horses neighed. A newborn foal galloped past, testing her legs. “There is no hell. He will be forgiven,” Daryl said. But, he added, the memories of that night will go with Miles Sanderson. And he will have to spend his time taking care of the ancestors now, to make up for what he did. Darryl Burns holds a photo of his sister, a 61-year-old community support worker who died while responding to a crisis call at a First Nation home. David Stobbe/Reuters Photos of Myles and Damien Sanderson, suspects in the murders, stand next to RCMP Assistant Commissioner Rhonda Blackmore at a press conference in Regina. Michael Bell/The Canadian Press Miles Sanderson showed up at his brother Damien’s house on the James Smith Cree Nation late on Friday, September 2 in a furious state. At 32, Miles had a long history of violence, but it was the attacks on his common-law wife and other family members that appeared most frequently on his criminal record. Domestic violence had come up again and again as a concern for those who knew him and those who dealt with him in the criminal justice system. That Friday, Miles had attacked his wife again. He had blackened her eyes and tried to run her over with a car and threatened to kill her parents, according to Damien’s wife, Skye Sanderson. “Damien was trying to protect her,” Skye said later. “Then, he left. He said he would try to calm Miles down.” People in James Smith’s community remembered how Miles had thrown his wife down the stairs when they were still teenagers. She had been convicted several times for attacks on herself and her family members. In 2015, she was charged with attempted murder for repeatedly stabbing her father, Earl Burns Sr., and aggravated assault for an aggravated assault on her mother, Joyce. Many other incidents were never reported to the police. Earlier in the summer, Miles had scared Damien so much that Damien had locked Skye and their children in a bedroom and stayed up all night, watching over Miles because he was afraid of what his brother might do. When Skye asked what had scared him that night, Damien told her that Miles had said he felt like killing his wife. He told Damien, “If I do, I’ll take out 10 more people.” The 10 victims, clockwise from top left: Earl Burns Sr., Bonnie Burns, Gloria Burns, Gregory Burns, Robert Sanderson, Thomas Burns, Lana Head, Christian Head, Carol Burns and Wesley Petterson. All but Mr. Patterson, who was killed at Weldon, died in the First Nation. RCMP, Facebook There was a scream that pierced the night. The dogs are barking like crazy. A woman running for her life in the dark. The First Nation was remote and isolated, the nearest police station 40 minutes away. It was Sunday morning and most people were sleeping. The doors of the houses had all the strength of paper. Even with dead, Miles drove them off with ease. People in the community say he had a knife taped to his wrist. The first call came in to 911 at 5:40 am. It was about a stab at the First Nation. Two officers with the Melfort RCMP detachment were dispatched three minutes later and drove straight to James Smith. Nineteen minutes later, a second call: Two people injured at another home. RCMP officers went up to the first house at 6:18 a.m., just as the sun was rising. The scenes they encountered were almost priceless. Three people lay dead outside the home of Bonnie and Brian (Buggy) Burns – 48-year-old Bonnie. her son Gregory Burns, 28; and Gloria Burns, a 61-year-old community support worker who had come to the home to help after receiving a crisis call. Bonnie and Buggy’s son, 11-year-old Dayson, had been stabbed in the neck. Their other two sons and two foster children were horrified. One of them hid behind a chair during the murders. In another house, Skye Sanderson’s father, Christian Head, 54, and his partner, Lana Head, 49, were found dead in their bedroom. Skye’s sister-in-law was badly hurt, her brother-in-law was clinging to life. Miles’ in-laws, Joyce Burns and Earl Burns Sr., who had been seriously injured by Miles years earlier, were also stabbed in their home. Earl had been injured protecting two grandchildren who lived with them. Earl, 66, was a cowboy, Army veteran and bus driver who had driven community children to school for 30 years. After being wounded, Earl had apparently tried to kill the killer, but died on his school bus between his home and the village. The aged yellow bus came to rest in a ditch, the vehicle and the ground below streaked and stained with blood. There was Thomas Burns, a 23-year-old father, dead in a road. His mother, Carol Burns, 46, had been stabbed to death inside her home. Robert Sanderson, 49, is believed to have been the last person killed in the community. In total, there were nine victims found dead in the First Nation that morning. Eighteen people were injured and more of them hid behind furniture, fought back or ran screaming for their lives until dawn. Memorial flowers lie in Weldon on September 5. Sara Hylton/The Globe and Mail Twenty miles away, in the town of Weldon, Wesley Petterson’s grandson called 911 from a basement as his grandfather — a 78-year-old widower who was to host a local senior coffee meeting that morning — was stabbed to death upstairs. The seriousness of the situation was immediately perceived by the police officers who were the first on the scene. Within minutes, the RCMP were preparing to issue an emergency warning to the public. By 7:12 a.m., cell phones across the province were buzzing with a warning that a series of stabbings had been committed by two male suspects and that people in the area should stay put or seek shelter immediately. Saskatchewan’s health authority has called a Code Orange, indicating a mass casualty event. As word of the attack began to spread, residents of James Smith gathered at Diamond Country Convenience, across the street from Bernard Constant Community School. The gas bar, which doubles as a grocery store, cafeteria and meeting place, was in this case a safe haven and refuge. The James Smith Cree Nation is a close-knit community, with families and lives deeply intertwined. There are approximately 190 First Nation houses. Most people in the community share only a few last names. As the names of the dead rolled in one by one, people broke down, again and again. Everyone had lost someone. Most had lost many friends and family members at the same time. A woman at the petrol bar had lost an aunt, a cousin, a son-in-law and her ex-partner, the father of her children. Mark Arcand holds a photo of himself with his sister Bonnie Burns on September 7. COLE BURSTON/AFP via Getty Images In Saskatoon, Bonnie Burns’ brother Mark Arcand woke up to the RCMP emergency alert and texts from his family. He drove straight to Bonnie’s house in James Smith. “Right outside her home, she was killed by senseless acts,” he said later, during an emotional press conference with his sister’s husband and their family. “She is protecting her son. He was protecting these three little boys. That’s why he’s a hero. She is a true matriarch in the First Nations way of life.” On social media, people mourned their family and friends or shared their own experiences. A survivor of the attack showed a stab wound on her back. Another woman posted a photo of a kicked door. In Weldon, a memorial of flowers grew next to Wesley Petterson’s home. RCMP Assistant Commissioner Rhonda Blackmore, the commander of the Saskatchewan RCMP, was somber as she addressed the media at a press conference in Regina Sunday afternoon. “It’s horrible what happened in our province today,” he said. The suspects in the murders have been identified as Myles and Damien Sanderson. Colorful skies outside Weldon, Sask., on Sept. 5 as the manhunt for stabbing suspects got underway in Saskatchewan.Sara Hylton/The Globe and Mail Monday morning dawned sunny and warm on the James Smith Cree Nation. Sometimes, the only sound was bugs buzzing in the long grass. Yellow crime scene tape surrounded five houses and the markers fluttered in the breeze. A day after the attack, the scale of the investigation was staggering. RCMP were working to process 13 different crime scenes, while officers who had traveled from the prairies used every investigative and technological tool available to find the suspects before anyone else was hurt. The whole province was on edge. In isolated country estates and small towns, people locked their doors or kept guns close. In Regina, where the suspects were seen in a black Nissan Rogue Sunday afternoon, each incident — a truck full of stolen goods flying through an intersection and into a home, a carjacking at a mall — seemed like it could be related. in the slaughter. Those still in James Smith…