(ominous music)
- [Narrator] Christine Wood, a young Indigenous woman,
goes missing in a city with a notorious reputation
for missing and murdered Indigenous women.
- We've always gotta push and push and push.
We've gotta find this girl.
- [Narrator] It's a parent's worst nightmare.
- Without a lead, a suspect or an arrest,
the trail can go cold fast.
- [Narrator] It's months before detectives
get their first clue in the case,
one that involves a social media account.
As investigators piece the clues together,
their search goes in many directions and places,
both physical and virtual, as they try to unravel
the mystery of what happened to Christine Wood.
- The unsolved ones, we have to stand up.
- And approach these cases in a way outside the box.
- Let the world know those out there
that did commit a murder,
there are people that are coming after you.
- There's just a lot of good people
trying to do the right thing.
- Because it's something
that you have to be passionate about.
- Solve this, bring some peace to the family, at least.
Just doing my job.
(unsettling music)
- [Narrator] The Woods have just stepped out
to run an errand, leaving their daughter Christine behind.
(tense music)
When they return and find their hotel room empty,
they aren't concerned.
They recall her saying
she's going to meet up with some friends,
and they expect they'll see her later.
The next morning when they wake, Christine isn't there.
On August 21st, two days since the last time
they saw their daughter,
they call the police and report her missing.
- Well, this is a nightmare for any parent.
It's especially frightening given the statistics
for murdered and missing Indigenous women.
- Winnipeg has a notorious reputation,
which makes her disappearance
even more of a cause for concern.
- [Narrator] Christine Wood and her family
are visiting the city of Winnipeg, Canada from Oxford House,
a First Nations Cree community in Northern Manitoba.
Oxford House is an incredibly remote
First Nations community 600 miles north of Winnipeg
and is only accessible by plane.
Christine is 21 years old, and like most people her age,
she spends a lot of time online using social media.
- For older generations, the shock of coming to the big city
would be much greater, but for someone like Christine,
she spends a lot of time online
and knows more about the world
than her parents would have at her age.
But knowing about the world from online
is not the same thing as experiencing it firsthand.
(tense music)
- [Narrator] On the evening of August 19th, 2016,
Christine Wood says goodbye to her mom and dad
as they step out to run an errand,
leaving Christine alone at the hotel.
But shortly after their departure,
Christine leaves and isn't heard from again.
- A report from Statistics Canada
shows that between the years 1997 and 2000,
the national rate of homicide for Indigenous
versus non-Indigenous women was almost seven times higher.
(tense music)
Another report from 2014 estimates
between the years of 1982 and 2012,
there were approximately 1,200 murdered and missing
Indigenous women and girls.
The issue of violence against Indigenous women in Canada
is endemic of a bigger problem
that reflects on the ongoing colonialism in this country.
- [Narrator] In 2014, Tina Fontaine,
a 15 year old Indigenous girl,
is found in Winnipeg's Red River.
Her body is wrapped in plastic
and discarded near the notorious Alexander Docks.
Her murder remains unsolved.
- Her death is tragic,
but it did spark a conversation that was long overdue.
- [Narrator] Following the death of Tina Fontaine,
a January 2015 issue of a Canadian national magazine
called out Winnipeg as the most racist city in Canada
for the daily injustices and indignities
suffered by the Indigenous peoples.
On August 3rd, 2016,
a mere two weeks before Christine Wood goes missing,
the Federal Government of Canada finally launches an inquiry
into missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.
- It was an initiative by the Canadian government
to impact that disproportionate level of violence
that was being experienced by Indigenous women and girls
and Two-spirited people.
- The inquiry is much needed for a country
that is looking towards reconciliation
and to deal with its history of colonization.
- You know the inquiry is really important,
but you think about what was happening in 2016,
and really it was of little assistance
to Christine's parents who were searching frantically
for their daughter and hoping.
I can just imagine how worried they were
that she was gonna become one of those statistics.
It would be heartbreaking.
I'm sure that the detectives from the Missing Persons Unit
who were working on this case
were doing everything they could to solve it,
and the timing of the inquiry just added to the pressure
for them to find Christine, hopefully alive.
- [Narrator] As detectives begin their search for Christine,
a key component of their investigation
is her online presence.
- In looking at Christine's online footprint,
it's clear that she's very active on social media,
but as of August 19, the day she goes missing,
there isn't a single post from her.
Detectives need to explore the possibility
that Christine has left and doesn't want to be found,
but there's no activity from her bank account
and no witnesses who have seen someone
matching her description.
The lack of her online activity is cause for alarm.
- It would be quite easy to let it lie and say,
well, she just doesn't want to be found,
but there's no evidence of that.
That's not like this girl.
She's a young girl.
She's been on social media lots,
she's been on Facebook quite a lot
and communicating with different people, different things,
commenting on whatever it is, and now there's dead silence.
- [Narrator] As time passes,
the likelihood of finding Christine alive diminishes.
Detectives in the Missing Persons Unit fear the worst,
though they continue to work the case.
The police tracked down
Christine's friends and acquaintances.
- Detectives learned that Christine didn't have a data plan
on her phone, so she didn't communicate through texts.
Instead, when she could connect to wifi,
she used Facebook to send messages.
According to her friends,
this was her primary means of communication.
- [Narrator] Detectives don't have any kind of picture
of the hours leading up to Christine's disappearance.
The last time she's seen is by her parents
before they leave the hotel.
Following that is a huge gap.
- But in this day and age,
everyone with a cellphone and online presence
leaves behind digital fingerprints.
They can help paint a picture of where someone was
and who they were last with.
If Christine was as active online as her friends say,
then the best hope the detectives have
of painting a picture of her last day is online.
- [Narrator] But acquiring records
and creating someone's digital fingerprint
is easier said than done.
- At this time, Facebook doesn't have any Canadian offices,
so the only way to acquire these records
is to contact US law enforcement.
- [Narrator] Eventually the Missing Persons Unit
is able to get a record of Christine's social media use,
but it's a lot of data to comb through,
necessary work if they hope to understand her final days
before her disappearance.
- A key piece of information
that comes from accessing Christine's social media accounts
allows detectives to see the last wifi network she used
to log onto Facebook, and that network leads them
to an address in Winnipeg's North End.
- Missing Persons find out
that the last time she used her social media
was August 20th at Burrows,
and it was used on a HTC phone, not her own phone.
It was used on a HTC device.
This is something that become very relevant
as the investigation goes on.
- [Narrator] Detectives are hopeful
that whoever lives at this address
has some information that will help them locate Christine.
(unsettling music)
On the evening of August 19th, 2016,
the Woods returned to their hotel room
to find their daughter Christine isn't there.
After two days without word from her,
they contact the Missing Persons Unit
at the Winnipeg Police.
The search for Christine is extensive,
but no one has seen or heard from her,
and she hasn't used social media since her disappearance.
Four months go by,
but detectives are hopeful they found a lead
when they obtain access to her social media account
and discover she connected to wifi at a Winnipeg address
on the night of her disappearance.
Investigators get their first break in the case
when they discover that the last time
Christine used her Facebook account,
she connected to the wifi network at a North End address
using a phone that isn't hers.
- They interview the resident at Burrows.
His name is Brett Overby.
Brett Overby has nothing, no history with the police.
He's an ordinary person living in that address,
goes about his daily business and goes to work.
- [Narrator] Overby tells detectives
that he doesn't know and has never met Christine,
and he describes his place
as having a kind of open door policy.
- He said that he often has people over in his place
and anybody can use his wifi.
He displays the wifi password,
said he'd often have a bonfire in his backyard
and people would come by and they could use his wifi,
and could be any number of reasons why his wifi was used.
Somewhat plausible.
- [Narrator] When Overby is asked if he has an HTC phone
or device, he replies no.
As Brett Overby is not a suspect at this time,
detectives release him.
There's still another lead they need to explore.
- As detectives continue their digital deep dive,
they find the only phone connected to the wifi
the night Christine goes missing is the HTC device
she used to log on to Facebook.
The theory that Christine was one of many
to log on to the network that night,
either at a house party or a bonfire, isn't tracking.
- [Narrator] Detectives interview
Brett Overby's ex-girlfriend.
She and Overby are on good terms,
and she doesn't believe he has anything to do
with Christine's disappearance,
but she does let one major detail slip.
- She also said that she did know
that he did at one time have a HTC phone.
That's a big red flag.
Brett Overby has lied to us.
We do know that she used a HTC phone,
and he's denied ever having a HTC phone.
- [Narrator] Christine Wood has been missing for months,
and the Missing Persons Unit finally has some evidence
that there may be foul play.
It's time for them to escalate the investigation.
- It's taken months to get to this.
March 2017 is when Missing Persons actually consulted us
and we decide that, me as a homicide supervisor,
decide that it's time to get more involved in this case
and let's look at it now as a homicide,
and we've got somebody here who's lying to us.
We decide that he is definitely now more than a witness.
He's definitely a person of interest
and heading closely towards being a suspect.
- [Narrator] Detective O'Donovan and the Homicide Unit
come to the conclusion that Overby is hiding something.
- Christine's Facebook account is used for the last time
at his address on a device he denies having,
but his ex-girlfriend says he still possesses.
This is enough circumstantial evidence
for detectives to justify investigating him further.
- It's not a search warrant that we're applying for.
It's a general warrant,
and it's a very difficult warrant to get.
Basically it can only be issued by a judge,
and it gives police the authority
to go and look for evidence that may or may not be there.
It's almost at the point of being a fishing expedition.
- [Narrator] At this point of the investigation,
Brett Overby and the acquaintance of Christine's
are likely the last two people
that spoke to her the day she goes missing.
Investigators are confident one or both of them
knows something that they aren't telling the police.
- Canada is a massive country
with over 6 million square miles of land.
In the past, if someone wanted to disappear,
it would not be hard, but in this digital age
to leave behind zero trace is extremely difficult.
- According to the RCMP's
National Center for Missing Persons
and Unidentified Remains, even though about 85% of cases
are resolved within the first week,
there are still approximately 500 cases left unresolved
each year in Canada.
- [Narrator] As time passes,
the likelihood of ever finding Christine diminishes.
Detectives are racing the clock before her trail runs cold.
Late in March, Detective O'Donovan
gets the green light to go ahead.
His warrant is granted by a judge on March 22nd,
roughly seven months after Christine's disappearance.
- We coordinate a search of that residence.
We have enough to arrest Brett Overby at that point,
but we certainly don't have anywhere near enough
to charge him, but we can arrest him
because he is a suspect.
I organize for the Forensic Unit to be ready
to go into his house to do an absolute,
complete search of his house.
By complete search,
I mean we're going to search it from top to bottom.
We're not just going to look for fingerprints.
We're going to examine everything.
We're gonna look for bloodstain,
we're going to look for blood spatter.
We're gonna look for any technological evidence
that may be there in his computers.
We're actually going to do a complete, total search.
If we have to, we're gonna look behind drywall,
we're gonna look in the floor.
We're gonna look wherever we have to look.
- [Narrator] Detective O'Donovan and the Homicide Unit
are now deeply involved,
which means the hopes of finding Christine alive
have greatly diminished.
What will they find when they enter the home
in the West End of Winnipeg?
On March 22nd, 2017, two days after the warrant is issued,
Detective O'Donovan and his team are in position.
- We decide that we're going to do this
first thing in the morning at 6:00 a.m.
We set up at Burrows.
At 7:27, Brad Overby leaves the house to go to work
and he's arrested outside his house.
(tense music)
He's taken into custody.
He's told that he may be charged with a murder
or a similar offense,
and he's brought into police headquarters
where he's now going to be questioned.
- [Narrator] With Overby in custody,
the forensics team enters the residence
to begin their thorough search for any signs
that a crime was committed here.
Detective O'Donovan conducts his interview with Overby.
Everything must be by the book,
as Overby is a suspect in a potential murder case.
- We can't bring him in and pretend that oh no,
he is not a suspect.
We have to give him his rights.
We have to tell him what his rights are
and we have to tell him what his jeopardy is.
- [Narrator] Brett Overby once again
denies knowing or having anything to do
with Christine Wood's disappearance.
Detective O'Donovan then brings up the HTC phone
that Christine used to log on to Facebook
using Overby's wifi.
He gives him the opportunity to retract his former statement
and explain why he lied.
- It's as much in his best interest
if he's got something to explain,
to explain to us and say no, I lied about the phone
because of this or for whatever reason,
and now it makes him, okay, well maybe he didn't.
He's got nothing to do with this.
- [Narrator] But Overby insists
that he doesn't have an HTC phone.
Either he's lying or his ex-girlfriend is.
Detectives will need to keep digging
if they hope to learn the truth.
(tense music)
(unsettling music)
Investigators interview Brett Overby,
who owns the home where Christine last connects to wifi,
though he claims he's never met her.
But when they interview his ex-girlfriend,
they discover he lied about the cell phone
Christine used to sign into social media.
Fearful that they're dealing with a murder,
the Missing Persons Unit involves the Homicide Unit,
and Detective O'Donovan gets a warrant
to search Brett Overby's house.
On March 22nd, 2017, the warrant is executed
and Overby is brought in for questioning
while forensics and investigators search his home
for any signs of Christine Wood.
- We're going to search it from top to bottom.
We're actually going to do a complete, total search.
- [Narrator] While Overby is being questioned,
investigators conduct a search of his home.
- They spend the entire morning upstairs
searching everything, and this is a small house,
but it's got quite a bit of clutter in it.
They take fingerprints, they dust for fingerprints,
they search for blood,
they use all the equipment available to them.
They use black lights and they use the luminol spray.
- Luminol spray is a reagent specifically formulated
for the detection of blood at a crime scene.
Even if the blood is invisible to the human eye
or someone has attempted to wash the area,
under the black light,
the spray will illuminate areas indicating blood.
- [Narrator] But so far on the main floor,
investigators find nothing to indicate
a crime occurred here.
Detectives have 24 hours
in which they can hold Overby as a suspect
without formally charging him with a crime.
If he won't confess anything in the interview
and if investigators find no evidence in his home
during this time, they'll have no choice but to release him.
The clock is ticking.
- It's a very difficult interview
because Brett Overby isn't answering any questions.
He's basically telling us his name and his date of birth
and his address, and he's not saying,
everything else is no comment.
I'm also looking at his past phone records,
and there's people I want to speak to.
Who are the two people he spoke to directly
after the HTC phone was used?
There's his friend and there's his ex-girlfriend.
His ex-girlfriend is also shocked,
but she tells us a few different things
and she tells us that he asked her to lie
about Plenty Of Fish and who his friends are.
He asked her to lie about the phone,
and she wasn't gonna lie for him.
- [Narrator] Overby's ex-girlfriend has been told by him
to lie about the popular dating app that he was using,
which connects him to Christine.
Overby also asks her to lie about who his friends are.
- She had a good relationship with him still,
even though they had split up.
They texted every day.
- [Narrator] But in spite of this,
Overby's ex-girlfriend is forthcoming with detectives.
- She also disclosed that during their relationship,
which went on for several years,
he had grown violent during that relationship,
and she had been a victim of domestic abuse,
and she said that was the reason
that they had split up.
She said that his drinking had progressed over the years
that they had been together.
She described specifically
a couple of instances of domestic violence.
These were things that I couldn't ignore.
- [Narrator] As detectives learn
of Overby's history of violence, they become more convinced
of his involvement in Christine's disappearance.
- At this point, I was certain that he was involved
in the disappearance of Christine Wood.
- [Narrator] It's approximately 3:00 p.m.,
and Detective O'Donovan steps out of the interview
to take a phone call from the forensic supervisor.
The supervisor informs him that the reagent spray
that they're using has reacted,
indicating that there is blood in a sink in the basement.
- To the naked eye, this place will look perfect,
it will look clean.
It'll look as if nothing has been done there.
When you put the ultraviolet light on the Bluestar,
it lights up like a blue Christmas tree,
and this is the case of the sink.
This to me is telling me okay, we got the right guy here.
We're in the right place.
- [Narrator] Detective O'Donovan has just learned
that the forensics team has detected blood
in the basement sink at Overby's house,
and not 20 minutes later,
he gets another call from the team.
They've discovered more blood spatter.
From the small droplets of blood that remain,
it's clear that someone has made the attempt to clean it up.
- He's finding blood spatter, and where he's finding it
is there's a weight bench in the basement,
and he's finding some blood spatter
on the legs of the weight bench
that hadn't been cleaned up, and underneath.
What it's doing is it's showing to him
that somebody was lying on the floor and was being beaten.
- Given where forensics is finding the blood,
it is unlikely that Overby has cut himself
and the blood is dripping downward.
- The blood is under the bench,
which means that it's been spattered from the floor upwards.
- [Narrator] The major question now is whose blood is it?
- At this time, forensics doesn't know whose blood it is.
It may or may not be Christine's, but given this trajectory
and where they're finding the blood,
it's telling them the story that this is a result
of a violent act.
- To the naked eye, he did a fantastic job in cleaning up.
To the forensic eye, he didn't do a good job.
He was sloppy and left a lot of evidence there.
- [Narrator] But the one piece of evidence
that isn't there is the body.
(tense music)
The circumstantial evidence against Brett Overby
is piling up.
He lied about the cell phone.
He has a history of violence against women,
and now there's been blood discovered in his basement.
But even when confronted with all of this,
he refuses to cooperate.
Without hard evidence,
investigators can't hold their suspect
for more than 24 hours.
There's little chance of getting a confession
from the silent Overby,
and while the blood found in the basement can be tested,
it could take weeks or even months
before the results come back.
The investigation's best hope is to find some evidence
that Christine was in the home.
(tense music)
(unsettling music)
The Forensics Team carefully search Brett Overby's house
for any signs that Christine was here.
Meanwhile, detectives are getting nowhere
with their tight-lipped suspect.
But when forensics finds traces of blood
and the cleanup of a crime scene in the basement,
detectives know they're finally on the right track.
- Winnipeg has a rich black topsoil, great for agriculture,
but beneath that is an impervious soil or hard clay
that is often found in older, unfinished basements.
The forensic team discovers in Overby's basement
an area of the soil that looks soft,
as if it's been recently dug up.
- The earth is soft in there,
which is different to what you'd see in a lot of houses
this age where it's hard packed.
It was covered with a sheet of plastic
and it was actually a construction type of plastic
that would be used as a vapor barrier.
There was very little dust on top of this plastic.
There was a bunch of household components
like small appliances stacked on top of this plastic,
and none of them had dust on them.
The forensic unit thought that this was odd.
I thought this was odd.
I said well, okay, let's try and find out
what's under this plastic,
so they meticulously moved all the components
that were on top, cut back the plastic and took it away.
I arranged for a cadaver dog to come
and to assist in the search of the basement.
- [Narrator] Investigators suspect that the earth
may be tampered with because a body might be buried there,
but the cadaver dog won't be able to assist
until the following day.
In the meantime, they'll either have to charge Overby
with a crime or be forced to let him go.
- It was a judgment call and a decision that I made
that I need to get this guy off the street.
I don't know if this girl is around.
I don't know if he's going to interfere with witnesses
that we don't know about yet.
I don't know what he's going to do or what he's capable of,
so the safest place for him right now is locked up.
- [Narrator] O'Donovan makes the call to use the testimony
of Overby's ex-girlfriend against him.
- Once we found out about the domestic violence,
I authorized my investigators who were interviewing him
to charge him, arrest him and charge him
with the domestic violence incident.
- [Narrator] Overby is taken to a pre-trial detention center
to be held.
- The next day, the cadaver dog is brought in
to search the house.
- Cadaver dog didn't find anything in the basement.
There was no reaction whatsoever.
I'm still not satisfied,
and we arrange for ground-penetrating radar to come.
- [Narrator] The radar arrives and the team goes to work.
- We run the ground-penetrating radar,
and there is definitely some anomalies under the ground.
We're thinking, oh my goodness, what could this be?
It could be anything, because the radar doesn't tell us.
It just tells us that there's an anomaly.
We've got nothing left to do except dig.
These guys never questioned that.
They said okay, well, there's only one way
we're gonna find out what the anomaly is,
and that is to dig it, and we'll have to dig it out.
They just picked up these short little shovels
and they're on their hands and knees
digging through this clay.
Winnipeg clay is hard.
It can be like concrete, and you can't swing a shovel.
You can't swing a pick axe.
You literally have to pick away inch by inch,
and they're doing this because there's a victim.
We need to find this victim.
- [Narrator] Investigators dig down four feet into the earth
and come up empty handed.
There is no body.
- There isn't a body in the basement,
but there are signs that lead detectives to believe
that a crime was committed there.
The samples of blood collected will tell the full story.
- We've got the presence of human blood in the basement.
We've got a massive sign of a cleanup in the basement.
Is this Christine Wood's blood?
We don't know that for certain,
because her DNA is not on file.
Christine is just an ordinary girl.
There's no reason for us to have her DNA.
I assign the Missing Persons Unit to get hold of her family
and to get her parents' DNA, and we'll do a familial match.
- [Narrator] To request DNA from Christine's parents
is a harrowing thing.
- This is upsetting.
I mean, now they know that we know something.
We can't really tell them what we're doing
because we don't do that.
We don't share too much early on in the investigation.
Even though we're months into it,
it's still early in the homicide investigation.
- [Narrator] All these months they've held onto the hope
that their daughter may be alive,
but the Woods know what this means.
In spite of their fears
that the worst thing imaginable may have happened,
the Woods want to know the truth about their daughter.
They provide DNA samples to see if the blood
found in Overby's basement is Christine's.
For now, both Christine's parents and investigators
will have to wait to see what the results tell them.
O'Donovan has arranged to have the blood samples
from Overby's basement tested against the DNA samples
provided by Christine's parents.
Unfortunately however,
there are a limited number of labs in Canada
that do this kind of testing.
- It's not CSI TV stuff
where they can have it in half an hour.
Here, it takes a lot longer.
In real life, things take a while.
- [Narrator] But given the nature of the case
and the ongoing search for Christine,
the lab promises a remarkable seven day turnaround
for the results.
In the meantime, O'Donovan is concerned
that the charges against Overby for domestic abuse
aren't going to stick and that he'll be released.
O'Donovan talks with the prosecutor,
who doesn't think the judge will oppose Overby's bail.
O'Donovan's fear has come to pass.
The domestic abuse charges against Overby don't stick,
and he is released from the pre-trial detention center.
- So this is between the week or 10 days
I'm waiting for the DNA, and him getting released
under domestic violence charges,
so I authorize surveillance on him 24/7,
and that's a huge undertaking.
It means that we have to have undercover people
follow him around, follow his every move
for seven days a week, 24 hours a day,
and see where he goes.
I am hoping that he's gonna panic
and go back and check on the body.
- [Narrator] Undercover detectives
keep a 24 hour a day watch on Overby.
After a couple of days of surveying him,
they follow him by car as he leaves his house.
- This is odd.
It's a dead end street.
He drives in and he parks at this pond,
and he's parked there for 20 minutes
and the Surveillance Unit are watching him,
and it's just strange.
What is he doing there?
Of course I'm thinking, why is he here?
What's he looking at?
This pond is still frozen.
It's still early April.
We keep looking at it,
keep thinking maybe she is, maybe she is.
He goes to that pond twice, two nights,
not two nights in a row,
but two nights within a few days of each other.
I'm thinking, oh my God, is Christine in the pond?
(tense music)
(unsettling music)
- [Narrator] Detectives believe they may have found a grave
dug in Overby's basement.
They try many things, but the results are inconclusive.
The only option left is to manually dig up the basement.
When the search yields no results,
detectives rely on blood samples taken from the scene,
but they must keep round the clock surveillance
on their prime suspect while they await the DNA results.
John O'Donovan of the Winnipeg Police
wants to search the frozen pond for Christine's body.
- I consult with my dive team
and the Underwater Recovery Team
in the Winnipeg Police Service,
and they say they can't get into the water right now.
It's frozen, and they've got to wait until the end of April
before, the earliest they can get into it.
- [Narrator] In the meantime, the DNA results come back.
- The results show that it was a match.
The blood found in Overby's basement
belongs to Christine Wood.
- Once we get confirmation that Christine's blood
is in the basement, the Crown attorney authorizes a charge
of second degree murder for Brett Overby.
This is good, this is positive.
- [Narrator] Overby is arrested on April 7th, 2017.
- [John] The Crown attorney is confident
that he's got a good case
with the evidence that we've given him,
and he authorizes the charge and we bring him in.
- [Narrator] But O'Donovan is worried.
Without a body or Overby's cooperation,
the investigation is going to have to rely heavily
on the physical evidence found in the home.
- Brett Overby says nothing.
He will not make a comment.
He will not engage the investigators in conversation.
He just keeps saying no comment, no comment.
During the search of Overby's home,
we find some blood stains under the stairs
which appear to be blood drops.
We find a massive sign of blood and a cleanup
at the end of the stairs.
The stairs in their house are sheer.
They're almost like a cliff face.
It looked like Christine was thrown down these stairs
and something happened at the end of the stairs,
and then she was dragged to the middle of that basement
where something else happened and she was attacked again.
We now have some blood spatter on the weight bench.
We have blood spatter on the stairs
and we have the massive signs of clean up.
We have a good case, but we don't have a body.
- [Narrator] By mid-April, the dive team is able to get into
the 10 foot deep retention pond.
They find nothing.
They then perform an expensive sonar search from a boat.
They're unable to find anything,
but they do detect some anomalies.
- I've always had a motto
that you can ever have enough evidence.
That's always been my motto.
We've always gotta push and push and push.
We've gotta find that body.
We've gotta find this girl.
So we drain the lake and we find an old car in there
that's been there for 15 or 18 years or something.
That was pretty much all that we found in there.
The extent that we went to to try and find this girl,
it's just, can't do enough.
We're gonna follow every single thing.
- [Narrator] But without Overby's cooperation,
there's no telling where Christine's body is.
Several months later, on June 1st, 2017,
Detective O'Donovan gets a call out of the blue
that a body has just been found
outside the city of Winnipeg.
- Right away, I know it's Christine.
Right away, I just knew it.
That's the only one that it could be,
and that was without hearing any of the details.
A farmer passing on his narrow road
driving through his property, checking on his crops,
noticed some plastic blowing in the field on the ground,
and he went to investigate it and take a closer look.
He was absolutely distraught and devastated
to find that it's actually a body
that had been buried on his property.
He knew right away that he was staring at skeletal remains
and called the police.
Once Christine's remains were removed from the ground,
she was wearing the clothing,
the same clothing that she had been reported missing in.
Again, I'm certain that this is Christine Wood.
The clothing is a match.
- Early in their investigation,
Missing Persons obtains the dental records
of Christine Wood, which they now use
to compare against the remains.
They come back a match.
This is the body of Christine Wood.
- [Narrator] Further investigation into Overby's computer
reveals a photo of him with Christine.
- There was three pictures of Brett Overby
sitting with Christine Wood
in the clothes that she went missing in,
and the clothes that she was wearing
when her remains were found, and he's holding the camera,
taking a selfie of the two of them,
his other arm around her as he's taking a selfie.
No doubt they were taken in the minutes or hours
before she was killed in his basement by him.
- [Narrator] With all the evidence stacked against him,
Brett Overby finally admits that he did kill Christine,
though he claims that it's self-defense,
that she went crazy and attacked him,
that he blacked out and doesn't remember killing her.
Overby argues in court
that he kills Christine in self-defense.
- He tried to justify it somewhat.
Killers, they always go to self-preservation
and to try and justify things and make things easier
and better for themselves.
I think Brett Overby was looking for the lesser charge
of manslaughter, which wouldn't have made it any better,
but the jury saw through him, the court saw through him,
the system saw through him,
and no, this was a murder all the way.
- [Narrator] On July 2nd, 2017,
Overby is sentenced to life in prison
with no possibility of parole for at least 15 years.
Detectives worked the case diligently
and didn't give up hope of finding Christine.
They also knew that they had a little luck on their side.
- It would never have been resolved
if the Missing Persons Unit hadn't followed up
on her last communication on Facebook,
where it came from and what device was used.
Her body might have been found,
but we would have never known who killed this girl.
- [Narrator] Christine Wood's case is a tragedy.
Unfortunately, in this country,
it is only one amongst many cases of violence
being perpetrated against Indigenous women,
Indigenous girls and Two-spirited people.
This injustice has been going on
far too long in this country, and it's a stain on Canada's
human rights record.
In 2016, a national inquiry commenced.
Recently the commission published their findings
in the final report of the National Inquiry
into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.
The final report is comprised of the truth
of more than 2,380 family members, survivors of violence,
experts and knowledge keepers.
It delivers 231 individual calls for justice.
These calls are directed at government,
institutions, social service providers,
industries and all Canadians.
Fortunately in this case, the police acted immediately
upon Christine being reported missing,
and that resulted in the case being solved.
- Christine Wood was somebody's baby.
She was once a child, a baby,
and her parents deserve that closure.
- There are far too many Indigenous women, girls,
and Two-spirited people that don't get the same result
as Christine Wood, and that has to change.
- She didn't deserve to die,
and her parents didn't deserve to go through the anguish.
They deserve the closure.
It's just our job to put that effort in,
and why wouldn't we?
I mean, we've gotta do this for these people,
and hopefully, if it was ever me,
somebody would do it for me.
It's our job and we're serious about it.
(unsettling music)