S2 Episode 8: Salesperson of the year AI transcript and summary - episode of podcast Missing & Murdered: Finding Cleo

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Episode: S2 Episode 8: Salesperson of the year

Author: CBC
Duration: 00:36:15

Episode Shownotes

Digging through archives in Saskatchewan, Connie makes a shocking discovery. As she investigates the controversial Adopt Indian Metis program which Cleo and her siblings were a part of, the man who started the program agrees to speak with her about its controversial origins, and legacy. For transcripts of this series,

please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/podcastnews/missing-murdered-season-2-finding-cleo-transcripts-listen-1.6733352

Summary

In this episode of 'Missing & Murdered: Finding Cleo', investigative reporter Connie Walker examines the Adopt Indian Métis (AIM) program, uncovering pivotal moments in Cleo's adoption journey. The program's controversial nature is highlighted as government decisions prioritized cost-savings at the expense of Indigenous children's cultural identities. Insights from social workers reveal the ongoing challenges of placing Indigenous children in permanent homes, while survivors like Raven Sinclair emphasize systemic racism and the traumatic legacies of the Sixties Scoop. The episode underscores the federal government's recognition of Indigenous children's over-representation in care as a humanitarian crisis and the lasting impact of colonial policies on Indigenous families.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (S2 Episode 8: Salesperson of the year) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:01 Speaker_20
Between 1973 and 1986, the Golden State Killer terrorized Californians.

00:00:07 Speaker_19
He scoped out the homes he would enter. Police would find cigarettes under a tree, by a window. So he was frequently there, at the window, in the backyard, in the dark.

00:00:18 Speaker_20
I'm Kathleen Goltar, and this week on Crime Story, why it took police more than 40 years to identify the Golden State Killer. Find Crime Story wherever you get your podcasts.

00:00:31 Speaker_01
This is a CBC Podcast.

00:00:37 Speaker_22
Previously on Missing and Murdered, Finding Cleo. So what are you thinking of when you see these ads?

00:00:47 Speaker_04
These remind me of these adoptions for little puppies and little kittens in the paper. Very discriminatory. It was only all our brown faces that were in there. She came out of her house. And she was holding the newspaper. These are my babies.

00:01:08 Speaker_22
I can't imagine the shock that Lillian must have felt. Just reading the paper like it was any other day. And turning the page and seeing a picture of her children. Jen and I look through weeks and weeks of papers. Every Tuesday there's an AIM ad.

00:01:24 Speaker_22
I hope we find something. Oh my gosh. I think, I think this is, I think this is them. That looks so much like them. I'm Connie Walker and this is Missing and Murdered Finding Cleo. An investigative podcast by CBC News.

00:01:47 Speaker_22
I think that is Annette and I think that's April.

00:01:51 Speaker_02
Oh my gosh.

00:01:52 Speaker_22
Yeah, it looks like them. There's no doubt that Ruth and Dawn will soon have their permanent home. Ruth is almost five and Dawn has just turned five. So when, when were April and Annette born? Oh my gosh. That would be the right age, right?

00:02:10 Speaker_22
She would have just turned six. They're very close, and that looks so much like her. I find the photo that Cleo's sister April gave us when we met. It's the adoption picture of her and Annette, the only two Simeganis kids who were adopted together.

00:02:28 Speaker_22
We compare it to the AIM ad we just found. Oh yes, that looks like them. Oh my gosh. Look at that picture that you have there. That looks exactly like them. Yes. April Annette. There they are. That's April's, her eyes. She has those distinct eyes.

00:02:49 Speaker_22
The girls in the paper are called Ruth and Dawn, but there's no doubt in my mind that this is April and Annette. We found it. This has to be the ad that Lillian saw in the paper. This must have been it.

00:03:02 Speaker_22
This must have been it because it was just a few weeks before the meeting with the minister. The girls are wearing matching white dresses with little round Peter Pan collars. They both have white ribbons peeking out of big curls.

00:03:16 Speaker_22
Their expressions are almost identical to the adoption photo. April has a big smile that scrunches up her eyes and that smile is small but you can see a hint of her dimple. Dawn has just turned five.

00:03:28 Speaker_22
Both girls are polite, intelligent, and well-mannered, with flourishing social development. Both are good-natured, cheerful, and affectionate.

00:03:35 Speaker_22
In Johnny's word file, we saw a note that makes sense now that we understand a little bit more about what was going on in Lillian's life. It's from June 1973, two months after Lillian saw April and Annette's ad.

00:03:51 Speaker_17
In early June, we received word from Saskatoon that she is applying to adopt her own children. This would be unnecessary, for she could launch an appeal of the court's decision instead through a lawyer.

00:04:04 Speaker_22
I think of Wayne. He wondered if Lillian understood the process when she asked the government for help and when her kids became permanent wards. But this note makes it clear that she really didn't.

00:04:17 Speaker_15
Johnny was not informed of the possibility of him being returned to his mom. He would be most happy with a decision like this, but would likely be very hurt if, at the last minute, it did not materialize.

00:04:31 Speaker_22
So two months after Lillian saw April and Annette's ad, she told the government she wanted to adopt her children back. This investigation has been about finding Cleo and the truth about what happened to her.

00:04:45 Speaker_22
We're still hoping to see the police report into her death. And in a few weeks, we're planning a trip with Christine to New Jersey. She wants to visit Cleo's grave and find more answers.

00:04:57 Speaker_22
But before we delve deeper and try to find out what happened in the weeks before Cleo died, I want to know more about how she got there in the first place. Why didn't Lillian get her kids back?

00:05:10 Speaker_22
What were the government decisions that led to Cleo being adopted into a white family in the United States? Who were the people who thought this was a good idea and why? Okay, we've just gotten to the Saskatchewan Archives in Regina.

00:05:28 Speaker_22
We're planning on spending the better part of three days here going through a bunch of archives from the 60s and 70s having to do with the Adopt Indian and Métis program.

00:05:41 Speaker_22
We know there was a backlash, but we really just want to try to get some insight from the government point of view. Within minutes we're set up in the library of the Provincial Archives with 12 banker boxes worth of documents.

00:06:02 Speaker_22
We also asked to see some of the old AIM TV ads.

00:06:10 Speaker_10
Sometimes when you think the world's gone mad and it's time to say goodbye Why don't you listen very hard the next time a baby cries? Because you know, he's calling out to you. And it's sure a happy sound.

00:06:29 Speaker_10
Each time a baby's born, the Lord tells mankind, take it one more round.

00:06:37 Speaker_22
It's actually a really sweet ad. The kids are doing normal kid things. There's a shot of two of them wearing matching red sweaters, reading a book. In the next shot, a little boy is kneeling next to a small bed, his hands clasped in prayer.

00:06:52 Speaker_22
One kid does a somersault on a bright red carpet. Actually, almost all of the shots are on the same blue couch and red carpet. I wonder if it's someone's living room or a fake set used by the advertising agency.

00:07:09 Speaker_22
Before they would show it to us, the archivists blurred the faces of the kids in this ad. But you can still see their little brown ears that peek out from behind the pixels. So you know they're all Indigenous.

00:07:21 Speaker_22
The ad seems to be saying, look at these kids. They're brown, they're cute, and they can be, quote, normal too.

00:07:36 Speaker_08
When the AIM program was announced in 1967, Sir O. MacDonald, the Minister of Welfare for the province, taped this statement.

00:07:59 Speaker_11
This is a special adoption program. For the past five years, the number of children in care of the Department of Welfare has been increasing by approximately 180 a year. This trend is causing us real concern.

00:08:14 Speaker_22
It's in black and white. MacDonald is holding a script, looking very earnest about this new government program he seems quite proud of.

00:08:21 Speaker_11
While we have had reasonable success in placing white children for adoption, we have had great difficulty in placing Indian and Métis children.

00:08:29 Speaker_11
One of the main reasons people have given for hesitating to take Indian and Métis children in their home is the fear of the possibility of discrimination against the child in the community itself.

00:08:42 Speaker_22
McDonald says racism is stopping people from adopting Indian and Métis kids, and it's the government's job to educate people and convince them that it's a good idea to open their homes.

00:08:53 Speaker_11
After all, Indian and Métis children have the same potential as whites. The only difference is the color of their skin.

00:09:01 Speaker_22
All right, what is this? Oh my gosh, this is a lot of paper. Jen and I start pouring through the papers and learning about the AIM program.

00:09:16 Speaker_22
Several of the documents describe Indian and Métis kids as, quote, hard to place, and put them in the same category as children with special needs, even if they don't have any.

00:09:28 Speaker_22
We come across plenty of instances where the government talks about the importance of giving kids a permanent home out of the foster system, but that wasn't their only motivation.

00:09:39 Speaker_22
An early AIM report highlights the fact that adopting out Indigenous kids will also save the government money. The report says paying foster parents is expensive. Back then, each child cost $1,000 per year.

00:09:54 Speaker_22
So in the long run, adopting out kids instead of fostering them will save the government tens of millions of dollars.

00:10:04 Speaker_22
The report also says that kids who stay in foster homes often end up in correctional institutions or juvenile court and that giving a child a chance to find a good home will also pay real dividends in the future.

00:10:19 Speaker_22
Kids who were hard to adopt in Saskatchewan were sometimes sent to the United States and beyond, like Johnny and Cleo. They stopped doing that in 1975, one week after Johnny's adoption was finalized.

00:10:34 Speaker_22
This is a department memo from Minister Alex Taylor to the Deputy Minister about adoptions to the United States. Our government certainly does not want to be seen as one which exports its native people in order to solve its native problems.

00:10:57 Speaker_22
So this is in a folder called North Battleford Correspondence. A folder marked Correspondence, North Battleford Region catches my eye. I read a strange memo about a social worker getting special recognition.

00:11:12 Speaker_22
Remember that Cleo and Johnny and all of their siblings went to court in 1972 in North Battleford. A judge made them all permanent wards of the province of Saskatchewan and therefore eligible for adoption. Here's a memo.

00:11:27 Speaker_22
She's getting an award of merit. You have been unanimously nominated by the AIM Center staff for the Salesperson of the Year Award. The Salesperson of the Year Award? Yes. It kind of sounds like she works at Sears.

00:11:46 Speaker_22
We will wait to receive further news of children who may appear suspiciously adoptable. What does all that mean?

00:11:53 Speaker_22
We don't quite understand why this social worker would be awarded a salesperson of the year award until a few minutes later when we see the original memo it was referring to. Oh, this is it. This must be the memo right here.

00:12:07 Speaker_22
The supervisor in North Battleford wanted to let head office know that the social workers there had a lot of court dates coming up and would therefore be getting more kids into care and more kids who'd be eligible for adoption.

00:12:21 Speaker_13
North Battleford has about 17 courts taking place before the end of October. We have babies, little boys, little girls, sibling groups we can mix and match. Some are blonde, some are dark.

00:12:33 Speaker_13
When the courts are completed and we obtain permanent wardship, histories and pictures will be forwarded as soon as possible.

00:12:40 Speaker_22
We are the only region that offers a full guarantee on our kids. They're all lovely, personable little people. And we know your families will be delighted with our selection.

00:12:51 Speaker_02
That's so strange. Oh my God.

00:12:55 Speaker_22
Like, wait, wait, wait. We've got some really good kids coming for adoption here. You can mix and match them. Our kids are guaranteed. That's such a strange tone to take. And then his response to it.

00:13:13 Speaker_22
You've been unanimously nominated by Ains Center staff for the Salesperson of the Year Award. Maybe it's all a big joke. I think the memo is supposed to be a joke.

00:13:24 Speaker_22
But it seems strange that social workers are joking about the selection of children they were making permanent wards and eligible for adoption.

00:13:34 Speaker_22
Advocates at the time weren't privy to memos like this, but they still had strong objections to the AIM program and especially its ads. The Métis Society of Saskatchewan wrote a letter to the minister calling the AIM ads racist.

00:13:50 Speaker_22
They questioned why children were placed in white homes and why some kids, like Johnny and Cleo, were sent to the United States.

00:14:01 Speaker_22
By 1972, it seemed the government bowed to pressure from Indigenous groups and slightly changed the name from Adopt Indian and Métis to AIM Centre.

00:14:12 Speaker_22
They shifted the focus to include, quote, all hard-to-place children, but acknowledged most of them would still be of Native origin. But Indigenous groups didn't just want a name change. They wanted to change the system.

00:14:26 Speaker_22
They pitched proposal after proposal to create Indigenous-run foster centres, or to find more First Nations and Métis families to adopt kids, and to fund programs for mothers.

00:14:38 Speaker_22
The Saskatchewan Native Women's Association wanted to create a center called Native Homes for Native Children.

00:14:46 Speaker_03
They said, Each child has a right to his cultural identity and heritage. Native children, in many cases, are being placed in white middle-class homes, which provide an environment alien to their emotional, spiritual, and cultural needs.

00:15:04 Speaker_22
Two years later, the group issued another memo. Whereas the Provincial Department of Social Services practices cultural genocide.

00:15:10 Speaker_22
They claimed the government, quote, practices cultural genocide by purposely placing Native children in white homes and that this violates their right to self-determination.

00:15:22 Speaker_03
Native children suffer cultural shock when placed in an alien white environment.

00:15:27 Speaker_22
Reading these memos, I'm reminded of Christine and how she says she's still affected by being disconnected from her community and culture. I also think about Cleo. How did being separated from her home affect her and her decision to take her own life?

00:15:46 Speaker_22
It's taken decades for the courts to recognize what those advocates were saying 50 years ago. In 2017, Justice Belobaba ruled in favor of 60 Scoop survivors in their lawsuit against the federal government.

00:16:01 Speaker_14
In his decision, he said, The impact of the removed Aboriginal children has been described as horrendous, destructive, devastating, and tragic.

00:16:14 Speaker_14
The uncontroverted evidence of the plaintiff's experts is that the loss of their Aboriginal identity left the children fundamentally disoriented with a reduced ability to lead healthy and fulfilling lives.

00:16:27 Speaker_14
The loss of Aboriginal identity resulted in psychiatric disorders, substance abuse, unemployment, violence, and numerous suicides.

00:16:37 Speaker_22
And I was surprised reading the next part of his decision. He said some researchers argue that the Sixties Scoop was even more harmful than the residential schools.

00:16:47 Speaker_14
Residential schools incarcerated children for 10 months of the year, but at least the children stayed in an Aboriginal peer group, they always knew their first nation of origin and who their parents were, and they knew that eventually they would be going home.

00:17:02 Speaker_22
Reading through the archives, it's clear that at the time people in government didn't believe they were practicing cultural genocide. We find a memo from 1974 from the Director of Social Services.

00:17:15 Speaker_22
He dismisses the idea that Indigenous culture even needs protecting.

00:17:20 Speaker_00
It appears that the Indian people are fearful that their Indian culture is in danger of disappearing.

00:17:26 Speaker_00
I do not wish to give the impression that I feel that the Indian culture is of no value, although it is quite difficult to understand exactly what it is.

00:17:34 Speaker_00
While attempts should be made to ensure that the child can live within this cultural heritage, this must be a secondary consideration.

00:17:45 Speaker_18
This woman is so adept at being a criminal, it's not funny.

00:17:49 Speaker_16
I've never seen a shit show quite like the story of Sarah King.

00:17:54 Speaker_18
She conned people out of $10 million.

00:17:58 Speaker_16
But infamy comes with a price.

00:18:00 Speaker_18
If we don't have her money by tomorrow morning, you will be gutted like a fish in Newport Harbor.

00:18:05 Speaker_16
Lady Mafia, available now on The Binge. Search for Lady Mafia wherever you get your podcasts to start listening today.

00:18:16 Speaker_22
I don't want to paint an unfair picture, though. We look through thousands of documents, and there do seem to be efforts by government to try to recruit more Indigenous parents.

00:18:27 Speaker_22
And there's plenty of evidence that social services in all regions of the province were struggling to deal with the increasing number of Indigenous kids in care.

00:18:37 Speaker_22
We see memos by bureaucrats grappling to respond to the ongoing criticism from Indigenous groups. For years, Nora Cummings and other Indigenous advocates seem to try everything in their power to get attention and make change.

00:18:53 Speaker_04
As grandmas and mothers and aunties, we know what it's like to go through that. Those children are first and foremost because I am their voice and I'm going to be their protector.

00:19:12 Speaker_22
So why didn't it work? If they had been successful, would it have made a difference for Cleo or any of her siblings? Why didn't social workers and politicians listen to people like Nora?

00:19:25 Speaker_22
Why did thousands of Indian and Métis kids have to go through the trauma that Justice Balobaba outlined in his decision? We tried to ask several people associated with AIM and child welfare in Saskatchewan those questions.

00:19:41 Speaker_22
But many people who were directly involved in the program are hesitant to talk about it. It's become so controversial. OK, we're here. Except for Otto and Florence Dredger.

00:19:53 Speaker_05
Hi, come right in. Come right in. How are you?

00:19:54 Speaker_22
I'm Connie. Fine. You're Connie? I'm Connie. Nice to meet you. Yeah, I'm Otto.

00:19:58 Speaker_02
Hi, Florence. Nice to meet you.

00:20:00 Speaker_22
They're both retired now, but they were social workers who worked for the government of Saskatchewan during the 60s and 70s.

00:20:08 Speaker_07
I always remember these two children were left without anybody looking after them. And there was no adult there. There was no food. and we found the mother. She had come home, and I don't know how I found her, but anyhow.

00:20:22 Speaker_07
And we talked about where she had been. She had grown up, or she had spent most of her time in a residential school, and you know, all those things. And I don't remember anymore.

00:20:33 Speaker_22
How often did you hear that? How common was that, that the mothers or parents were residential school survivors? Oh, just about everybody. And did you have any knowledge of residential schools at that point? Like, did you know what was going on?

00:20:46 Speaker_07
Oh, yeah, yeah. You did? Yeah, yeah. You know, we were young social workers. We weren't in policy positions or anything like that at that point.

00:20:58 Speaker_22
And you tried to do the best you could with... They might not have been in policy positions when they first started out. But within a few years, Otto and Florence had moved to Regina.

00:21:09 Speaker_22
While Florence continued as a frontline social worker, Otto went on to start the AIM program.

00:21:17 Speaker_05
I was a director of child welfare.

00:21:19 Speaker_22
So that would have been right when the AIM program started. So what was the AIM program or what was the goal of the AIM program?

00:21:28 Speaker_05
Stability. So our thinking was that What we need to do is develop a program that will focus on getting basically many Indian children into adoption homes.

00:21:44 Speaker_22
Otto echoes a lot of what we found from the archives. He says it was harder for them to place Indigenous kids in permanent homes, and those that didn't get adopted often ended up in bad situations.

00:21:57 Speaker_22
They felt security and stability were the most important.

00:22:02 Speaker_05
And the objective was to get as many adoption homes as possible in the First Nations communities for First Nations kids.

00:22:10 Speaker_22
So there wasn't a focus on adopting into white families?

00:22:15 Speaker_05
Into everybody, into any homes.

00:22:17 Speaker_22
Otto rejects the idea that this was a deliberate continuation of the cultural genocide that Indigenous advocates warned against. What was the reaction from the public to that?

00:22:28 Speaker_05
There was a very good response. So there were a lot of children that were placed into adoption. It was not in terms of, this is an alternative to the residential schools and we're taking them away and then putting them into white foster homes.

00:22:43 Speaker_05
That was not the basis of the child welfare program.

00:22:46 Speaker_22
But if it wasn't the basis, it was often the result.

00:22:49 Speaker_05
Well, the result was that the children were placed for adoption, but the alternative was for them to be in foster homes. because of the neglect there was or the abuse that there was in families.

00:23:02 Speaker_07
Some of the cases, I mean, it's just horrendous what kids were going through.

00:23:07 Speaker_22
Otto was only part of the AIME program for the first few years, so he says he didn't hear much about the opposition at the time, but he's heard plenty since then. But you mentioned the Sixties Scoop.

00:23:18 Speaker_22
I'm curious what you think about, because, you know, it's recently just started getting a lot more attention.

00:23:25 Speaker_22
And I think that, you know, most of the attention is focused on the kids who are now adults and who are recovering from their experiences, but are very critical of programs like AIM. What do you think of those criticisms that they have?

00:23:47 Speaker_05
Well, for them, from where they're sitting, they're appropriate. But some of the assumptions that are made by some people are not accurate.

00:24:00 Speaker_22
Like what?

00:24:00 Speaker_05
Which ones are not accurate? Their assumptions are that they were taken away from their families just in order to then be in white families, and that's what I mean.

00:24:13 Speaker_22
So you take an issue with this scoop part of it, that implies that it was not because of... Deliberately taking away their culture.

00:24:25 Speaker_05
But I can understand the hostility that people have because they were taken away from their identity. And obviously that is so that I don't criticize them. That's the dynamic of it.

00:24:43 Speaker_22
Otto's been hesitant to speak publicly about his role in the AIM program because he says he understands why survivors of the Sixties Scoop are angry. But he feels it is not a black and white issue. There are many shades of grey.

00:24:59 Speaker_05
And the reason some of us like myself have not spoken out against the Scoop is because it would immediately be seen as being defensive. and critical of what's happening.

00:25:12 Speaker_05
And so that the only way I feel that we can talk about it is with people like yourself who are looking at the depths of this thing, trying to get an understanding of what really is going on.

00:25:25 Speaker_05
either this kind of like the podcast you're doing or research that is done so that you really get an understanding of what the dynamics are. Otherwise, it's just seeing, oh, well, those guys are just being defensive of the evil that they've done.

00:25:40 Speaker_22
No, I appreciate that. And we are very much trying to take that approach where we're looking at the bigger context and exactly what you're saying, trying to help people understand how.

00:25:49 Speaker_05
And that's why I'm prepared to talk to you about that.

00:25:53 Speaker_22
I appreciate it. Having said that, do you have any regrets about the program or the way it was executed, or even not just AIM, but child welfare in general at that time?

00:26:03 Speaker_05
I wouldn't say regrets. I say I have mixed feelings.

00:26:14 Speaker_22
I mean, just in hearing so many stories and experiences from people who went through those kinds of adoptions into white families, there are so many devastating experiences. Do you feel like that was a success?

00:26:33 Speaker_05
There's never been a study done in terms of how many really worked out very well.

00:26:40 Speaker_12
Did you hear those stories, though?

00:26:42 Speaker_05
Pardon? Did you hear the stories? Oh, yes. Oh, yeah. And I've heard those kind of stories from when they were adults. But they're not the ones that are going to speak out.

00:26:54 Speaker_05
And so that's why you need a research study on that in terms of seeing, OK, now, of all the children that were placed, how many worked out well, and what the percentage is, I wouldn't know.

00:27:12 Speaker_22
What would you imagine a study like that would find, though?

00:27:16 Speaker_05
I would find that well over half of them would be on the positive side.

00:27:29 Speaker_22
There are academics who study the success rate of transracial adoption, and others who have dedicated their careers to studying Indigenous child welfare. Raven Sinclair is a Cree academic from Saskatchewan, and she's also a Sixty Scoop survivor.

00:27:46 Speaker_21
The practice has always been about removal because of the cultural biases, right? We've never been perceived of as people who can raise children.

00:27:55 Speaker_22
Raven is researching just how common it was for these kinds of adoptions to break down. She tells us about an academic named Christopher Bagley who studied this in the 1990s.

00:28:07 Speaker_21
But Indigenous to white transracial adoption is the anomaly. It's just a failure and he thought it was because of the denigration of Indigenous culture. Basically racism, systemic institutionalized and individual interpersonal racism.

00:28:25 Speaker_21
had, you know, played some factor. And I have to agree with him, absolutely.

00:28:30 Speaker_22
Raven says children who survived the Sixty Scoop not only had to deal with racism in society, but often in their own homes.

00:28:39 Speaker_21
So when we experience racism, we're in isolation. So it becomes a really, really solitary journey. There's only so much of that psychological turmoil you can contend with before you have to just

00:28:53 Speaker_22
Raven says the research found that half of the adoptions of Indigenous kids in white homes broke down.

00:29:01 Speaker_22
Jen tells Raven this sounds a lot like what happened with the Samaganis children and it resonates with her because Raven also left her adopted home at a young age. Your story is so much like the story.

00:29:13 Speaker_21
I like hearing that. I grew up thinking I was the only one.

00:29:17 Speaker_22
But Raven and Cleo and Johnny and Christine were not the only ones. There were thousands of Indigenous kids apprehended in the Sixties Scoop, and there are still thousands of kids in care today.

00:29:31 Speaker_22
Some say that the number of Indigenous kids in care is higher than during the height of residential schools.

00:29:37 Speaker_21
Cindy Blackstock did incredible research and she said Indigenous children have spent between 89 and 2012 the equivalent of 66 million nights in foster care. That is a machine. So has it changed? No, it's gotten worse. It's gotten worse.

00:29:58 Speaker_22
The federal government now agrees with people like Raven and Nora and says that taking Indian and Métis kids from their homes was wrong.

00:30:08 Speaker_22
They call the over-representation of Indigenous kids in care a humanitarian crisis and they've promised swift action.

00:30:17 Speaker_12
We are facing a humanitarian crisis in this country where Indigenous children are vastly, disproportionately overrepresented in the child welfare system.

00:30:27 Speaker_22
But I've learned through this story that helping Indigenous children is about more than ensuring they don't lose their culture in an alien environment. I wonder if the government solutions will actually support families who are still struggling.

00:30:43 Speaker_22
Struggling with poverty, insecure housing, struggling with the ongoing effects of residential schools, struggling with the racism that still divides us.

00:30:55 Speaker_22
The people behind the Sixties Scoop also believed they were going to make things better for the Indigenous kids in their care. Will the latest government initiatives actually help kids like Cleo and mothers like Lillian?

00:31:10 Speaker_22
There's a note in Johnny's ward file that I read before and didn't think much of. But now that I know more of Lillian's story, I realize how poignant this one little line is.

00:31:23 Speaker_22
Five months after all of her children were made permanent wards and eligible for adoption, there was a note from February 1973. It says that Lillian left a Valentine's gift for Johnny at the foster home where he was staying.

00:31:42 Speaker_22
We don't know why, but Lillian wasn't successful in her attempt to get her children back. Instead, they were all adopted out into white families, and she didn't see them again for years. She reconnected with all of them as adults, except Cleo.

00:32:01 Speaker_22
Nora, the woman who tried to help Lillian get her kids back, also lost touch with her for many years, until 2012, at a hearing for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

00:32:15 Speaker_22
The TRC traveled across the country, hearing from survivors of residential schools, to bear witness to their stories and to ensure that this dark chapter in Canadian history would never be forgotten. Nora went to the event in Saskatoon.

00:32:33 Speaker_04
I walked in and she's in this wheelchair and I looked at her. And I looked at her and then she looked at me, because I was a Thibodeau then, and she looked at me and she said, my angel Thibodeau. And I said Lillian.

00:32:48 Speaker_04
So we, of course, we hugged and had a cry.

00:32:51 Speaker_22
Nora says that Lillian asked her to be there when she spoke about her life at the TRC hearing.

00:32:58 Speaker_04
So I had to go and speak at one of them. She said, can I come with you and tell my story? So I pushed her and I was in a teepee. And I took her in and she talked in a circle. She talked about losing her children and now getting her children back.

00:33:17 Speaker_04
I don't know how long she got to, when her children came back, how much time she had with her children. But whatever time it was, she was very happy about it. And for her children to know that their mother never, never gave up on them.

00:33:35 Speaker_04
And a lot of the people that sat in there were very sad and they shook hands with her and hugged her. And she was very proud that they told her, you're a very strong lady. So she had her say. And that was the last time I seen her.

00:33:57 Speaker_22
This has been an incredibly difficult story to uncover. I know that to truly understand Cleo's story, we need to know Lillian's. We need to feel the weight of what they both went through.

00:34:12 Speaker_22
When I think that this is just one family out of thousands, it feels heavy in my chest. Learning about Cleo and Lillian has helped me see the ripple effects across families and generations.

00:34:28 Speaker_22
I'm beginning to understand how women and girls in particular have borne the brunt of the effects of the violence that colonization and residential schools and racism have had on our communities.

00:34:44 Speaker_22
My heart breaks for a young Lillian, only seven years old, living all alone in the world that Roderick King described. And then for a young Cleo, in and out of foster homes, and sent away to live in a foreign place all by herself.

00:35:05 Speaker_22
But I know this is not the end of Cleo's story. Christine and the rest of her siblings want to know what's in that police report. We're headed back to New Jersey with Christine.

00:35:16 Speaker_22
She's determined to find more answers about her sister and to try to find out why Cleo took her life. On the next Missing and Murdered, Finding Cleo. Why does it say Barry? Barry is underlined. I love Barry. It's all underlined. Who's Barry?

00:35:34 Speaker_22
She says, I'm going to have a gun to protect me from rape. It feels like we're looking at a picture of Cleo's life in New Jersey through a foggy glass. And the more we read, the clearer it becomes.

00:35:48 Speaker_06
She was hitchhiking, from what I understand. She actually contacted some young man with a truck, with a pickup truck. and she was supposed to meet him and go up to Canada then.

00:36:01 Speaker_22
There's somebody named Barry who's referenced in this police file. Does that name ring a bell?

00:36:08 Speaker_06
Connie, this is not going to be a very pleasant conversation.

00:36:14 Speaker_22
To hear more about the history and legacy of residential schools in Canada, check out the first season of our podcast. To find it, just follow the links on our website at cbc.ca slash Finding Cleo.

00:36:28 Speaker_22
Finding Cleo is written and hosted by me, Connie Walker. The podcast is produced by Marnie Luke and Jennifer Fowler. Mika Anderson is our audio producer and our senior producer is Heather Evans.

00:37:10 Speaker_01
For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.