WARNING: This story contains graphic content and vulgar language.

Part 1: ‘Crazy, crazy criminality’

When Arron Linklater leaves his house, the essentials come with him: Wallet. Phone. Keys. Bullet-proof vest.

For 30-odd years, Linklater has been dealing cocaine in Dawson Creek, a small town tucked within the sprawling farmland in northern British Columbia at the origin point of the Alaska Highway.

Although he lives in a modest bungalow, Linklater boasts that his cocaine business can bring in hundreds of thousands of dollars a month. In all that time, the RCMP has only busted him once for drug trafficking.

A member of the nearby Carrier Sekani First Nation, Linklater has deep roots in town. His grandfather was Dawson Creek’s mayor in 1951, during its first major population boom thanks to the area's first gas plant and the arrival of the Pacific Great Eastern Railway. In those days, a Linklater didn’t have to worry about being shot while walking through town.

But this is no longer his grandfather’s Dawson Creek.

Death, by the needle or by the bullet, now stalks its streets.

“He’s turning in his grave right now,” Linklater said of his grandfather. “I’m his only grandson who would carry the Linklater name on. He’d just say: ‘You’re a f–king idiot.’ He’d probably slap me.”

Alaska Avenue, also known as B.C. Highway 97, which flows into the Alaska Highway, runs through Dawson Creek. The town finds itself besieged by a wave of killings and crime that has lasted more than a year. (Timothy Sawa/CBC)

Linklater has watched the town evolve from a farming community into a booming oil-and-gas region that spawned more clients for his wares. With more money came more drugs, from cocaine to fentanyl. And more drugs meant more crime and violence.

There have been 13 unsolved homicides in four years — 11 since January 2023. Like justice, an end to the killing seems elusive in the town of 12,500 souls.

For more than a year, the fifth estate has been investigating this cyclone of crime , answering an email from a viewer desperate for attention and help. Last year, the RCMP told the fifth estate they expected “some level of success” within six months in what were then investigations into 11 unsolved killings in Dawson Creek.

Watch the full documentary, “Dawson Creek: Behind the Fear,” from the fifth estate on YouTube or CBC-TV on Friday at 9 p.m.

The fifth estate discovered the justice system has been unable to keep the worst criminals off the streets and has found more connections between the killings and the local underworld.

While police say they remain confident they will make progress in some of those homicide cases, the killings have continued.

“Get investigators here that will do something about it, get rid of the drug dealers,” said resident Laura Lambert, whose two nieces are among the slain. “We want our kids back.”

In 2024, the RCMP said they would have ‘some level of success’ in solving some of the killings of these 11 people in Dawson Creek. To date, no arrests in any of these cases have been made. Top row, left to right: Lance Patterson, an unidentified male, Bryon Horne, Rob Girbav. Middle row, left to right: Tina Nellis, Adam Roy Isely. Bottom row, left to right: Chris Engman, Dave Domingo, Darylyn Supernant, Renee Supernant Didier, Cole Hosack. (Tim Kindrachuk/CBC)

In the absence of justice, Dawson Creek is gripped in rumour and fear. Everyone has a theory about who is killing whom and why.

“I think the biggest misconception here is knowing and proving are two completely different things,” said RCMP spokesman Staff Sgt. Kris Clark.

The rumours are sometimes fuelled by threats on social media with a singular message — opening your mouth might be the last thing you ever do. One of those threats came as recently as Thursday, as the fifth estate was preparing to broadcast its most recent investigation into the killings in Dawson Creek.

On Oct. 29, as the fifth estate prepared to broadcast its latest investigation into the killings in Dawson Creek, Jesse Ray Stevens — the half-brother of Tanner Murray, one of the town's most notorious criminals — posted this message to his Facebook page, railing against 'rats who talk.' (Jay Remy/Facebook)

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