Who Stole Clarence Darke’s Bones?
· 22 min. read
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Regina has had her fair share of major crimes over the years. From characters like Louis Riel and Tootsie Lefleche to victims like JoAnn Wilson and Polly Hutchinson, high profile crime has been a fascination of our city since our first execution. But in 1988 a crime like no other was committed in our city’s oldest cemetery. The crime was grave robbery, and the victim was Clarence Darke, son of the infamous former mayor Francis Nicholas Darke.
The following article will go into the twists and turns of the police investigation, and a handful of some highly questionable characters that appeared along the way. However, I know your time is precious, so I’ll give you the answer first and then take you on the journey later.
After just over eleven months of investigation, on October 12, 1989, the Honourable Judge K. E. Bellerose sentenced 24-year-old Anthony Paul Pasap (1964 - 2000), to three months in the Provincial Correctional Centre – one month for failing to appear in court the first time, and two months for interfering with the human remains.
Judge Bellerose: “I’m not suggesting that you’re guilty for all the vandalism in the cemetery or this sort of thing or necessarily want to make an example, but I mean, you offer very little excuse as to why you’re going into there. I think the dead person expect, you know, some sort of dignity once they are dead and I don’t think that includes going into their crypts, breaking and entering with respect to their -- this is almost very close to a break and entering because you’re going in an enclosure. In addition, it is interfering with the human remains of this Clarence Darke.
"[...] People get a little uptight, and maybe justifiably so, when people start interfering with the dead. I think every culture has [a] sort of respect for the dead. You look at the Chinese, they have great reverence, Native culture, there’s always respect for the deceased and that sort of thing, and I think that’s in every culture, there’s something about people who have been deceased or -- or there’s a certain element of human decency expected to be extended to them.
"I think in the circumstance, what I’m going to do is: to the failing to appear, you’re sentenced to a period of one-month; on the interfering with the human remains of Clarence Darke you’re sentenced to a period of two months [...]. The total sentence is one of three months in the Provincial Correctional Centre.”
If it seems like a light sentence, that’s because it was. In 1981, Pasap, then 17, was in the news for constructing homemade explosives and having one detonate in his hands, severely damaging his right hand and leaving him hospitalized. Two years later, in 1983, the now 18-year-old was found guilty of thirteen counts of break-ins and thefts throughout the city, and was sentenced to two years plus a day in the Provincial Correctional Centre, plus one year of probation. This would have put him out of probation in 1987, just a year prior to the breaking and entry of the Darke Mausoleum in 1988. By the time of his conviction however, he was turning his life around, with an apartment in Winnipeg, a job as a painter and a five-month-long steady relationship.
The judge took this info into account after hearing his testimony, and gave him a light sentence so he could continue down the path of being a contributing member of society.
If you’ve heard this story before, you might be a little confused. You may have heard that the crime was committed by some college students, or it was committed by Satanists, or all the caskets had been opened. Surprisingly, these all have elements of the truth to them, but none of them are related to Pasap’s crimes.
The Night of the Crime
According to Pasap, the reason for going into the mausoleum and stealing the bones is pretty simple: “I was really scared when I did it, even though I was drunk. I really didn’t have any purpose in going in there, I just did.” When pressed if he had a reason for doing it, such as looking to steal rings or jewelry, Pasap answered “There wasn’t a reason.”
Pasap said that he and his sister were wandering around the cemetery intoxicated, looking to buy something (that part of the recording was indiscernible). They then found the doors of the Darke Mausoleum open and went inside. What they found were caskets that were broken and smashed. He found a “box” at the foot of a casket and took it. This box held the cremated remains of Clarence Darke. Pasap didn’t realize it was a box full of cremated remains at the time, however. He would also take some bones.
Pasap would then put the box and bones in some bushes on the north side of the cemetery and leave them there. The remains would sit there for a few weeks until Pasap returned to put the bones back.
“I felt really bad about what I’d done, it was the right thing to do even though it took me a couple of weeks to figure that out.”
However, Pasap soon encountered a problem. Between taking the bones out of the mausoleum and returning them, the doors of the mausoleum had been closed and locked. He tried to use a knife to pry open the doors, but was unable. He then decided to leave the bones and cremated remains behind on the steps.
He also left his knife behind too – “I thought I just dropped it and lost it.” – but had no explanation for why it was covered in blood. “I don’t know where it came from, it was my knife, but I wouldn’t hurt anyone or cut anyone. I don’t remember cutting myself, I just don’t know.”
On November 11, 1988, headstone designer Ed Gaertner was surveying the cemetery when he found the items Pasap left behind. A week prior, over a hundred headstones had been smashed in the cemetery. This was the latest of a string of vandalism in the cemetery. Not even the mausoleum was safe as it had been broken into three times as well. To try and prevent this from happening yet again, Gaertner changed the locks on the mausoleum a few days prior. So, when he walked past the mausoleum and saw a knife, he was concerned – and then he saw the box and the bones. Gaertner thought this was from an earlier break-in, and that the bones had been out for a much more significant time.
“It’s a disgrace that this cemetery is going to the dogs. It’s sad.” Gaertner would tell the newspapers.
Just by chance, had Pasap had a change of heart just a few days earlier and returned the bones sooner, Gaertner would have locked them inside and nobody would be any wiser.
The Investigation
Gaertner would call the authorities shortly after finding the remains, and they would arrive at approximately 2:15pm that afternoon. They would take a sketch of the scene, illustrating the approximate location of the urn, bones and knife, and then take them in as evidence. Once securing the scene, they would then enter the mausoleum. Their testimony states that “the damage in the crypt from the break-in in June [19]85 [...] had not been repaired. The casket on the west side was just pushed back into the vault. It should be noted that the casket is rotting.”
The 1985 incident in question was when several youths entered the mausoleum via a boarded up window, and opened three of the caskets. It was determined at the time that nothing had been removed.
The knife, bones and box of cremated remains were taken to the police station for investigation. Their initial concern was whether the bones found were human or animal. However, it wasn’t until they opened the box of cremated remains and discovered a Certificate of Cremation for Clarence Thomas Darke (1966) did they realize what they were looking at. The going hypothesis at this time was that these were taken during the 1985 break-in and that “for some unknown reason the culprit had returned them.” Once photographed and recorded as evidence, the police made arrangements to return the bone and urns back to the mausoleum.
Four officers were put on the case to solve this mystery. They were Sargent Schimmellman of the General Investigation Section, Constable Terry Edwards of the Cults Department, Sargent H. Layman of Crime Stoppers and Constable B. Schmidt.
One of the challenges the officers faced was that the cemetery had been frequently vandalized that year. For example, there were three individuals charged in March for vandalism, a major incident in November that saw nearly 100 graves damaged (this is the one Ed Gaertner was looking into when he discovered the knife and bones) and an additional vandalism in December during the Pasap investigation. In the December incident, between 100 - 150 additional headstones had also been damaged.
The first obvious suspects were the three individuals charged for the March vandalism, but all three were cleared.
Three other potential suspects were also interviewed by police. They were already known by the police after stealing a granite tombstone from the cemetery in November of 1987. Due to the crime being in the same location, and it being around the anniversary of the tombstone robbery, they were thought to be potential suspects. However, they were found to have no connection to this incident.
Another interesting interview that held the most promise occurred in December. One individual said that they, along with four other people, were responsible for the crime. When the police questioned them, however, they would not elaborate. Since we know Pasap was the sole guilty party, it’s possible that these five people had gone into the mausoleum another time, before or after Pasap, but before Gaertner had changed the locks. However, this is just speculation.
Crime Stoppers would make a broadcast about the crime in December, and they would get a tip from an employee of the University of Regina. She said that some of the students of the Fine Arts Department were responsible for the crime. Following this, the police interviewed the head of the department the following January. The head of the department (name redacted) was not surprised at the police’s arrival. There had been some ongoing in-house debate at the university for several months already, causing a large rift among “powerful personalities” at the university which led to “rampant rumours” across the campus.
The issue in question was a controversial film produced by several of the students. The film started off with three men looking over the grave of a recently deceased Jewish man and were contemplating his demise. The film discussed death camps in Nazi-occupied territory (the police records state Germany, though likely referring to Poland). The mention of the camps and the comments made in the film became a problem at the University of Regina as many thought they were anti-Semetic in nature.
However, although controversial and divisive, the production was allowed to proceed, and was filmed on October 21 and 23, 1988, under the supervision of an 82-year-old Jewish professor who worked at the University of Regina. The police would review the film four months later in January of 1989 and note that although the costuming of the menu in the film appeared to be Satanic, nothing indicated these students were responsible for the crime. The police also noted in their report that the film was “amateurish and badly done”.
The Satanic Connection
Five local individuals known for participating in Satanic practices were also interviewed by Constable Terry Edwards, and although all five were eliminated as suspects, they were kept on file as helpful informants.
If it seems odd that the police were so heavily focused on Satanism being related to this crime, it was very much a sign of the time. “Satanic Panic” was sweeping through the United States, and bled up into Canada as well. Throughout the 1980s, there were debates in The Leader-Post between professionals and students about rock music and their subliminal messages of devil worship. Many bands that were discussed were Alice Cooper (who was in Regina in 1987 for his The Nightmare Returns Tour), as well as Twisted Sister, KISS, and even Electronic Light Orchestra (ELO).
Simultaneously, a wave of cattle mutilations had happened in Alberta, and many believed Satanists were responsible. By the 1990s, the blame was shifted from Satanists to aliens and UFOs instead.
To compound these fears, in 1987, both the Southside Pentecostal Assembly and the Circle of Life Centre in Regina had been caught on fire, and Satanic imagery was found spray painted on the buildings.
Although now it’s often looked at as a type of mass hysteria (see the 1992 Martensville Satanic sex scandal), many feared Satanism was threatening the very soul of the country.
An Anonymous Phone-call
On April 12, 1989, an anonymous call was made to Inspector Wayne Eaton identifying Anthony Paul Pasap as a suspect. The contents of the call have been redacted so it is unknown who this caller was, other than it was a female. It may have been Pasap’s sister, who was with him at the time of the crime, or possibly Pasap's girlfriend or a friend. At the time of the call, Pasap was in the process of settling in Winnipeg with his girlfriend, as he had been living there for five months according to his October 1989 court transcript.
Whatever the call said, it was incriminating enough that Pasap was charged and ultimately pleaded guilty to his crime, being sentenced for three months in the Provincial Correctional Centre.
I am not sure what happened to Pasap after he got out of jail in early 1990, but I was able to find his grave online. He is buried in Dawson Cemetery in Estevan, at the age of 35, in the year 2000.
Final Thoughts
Putting together this article took several months, and wouldn’t have been possible without the help of the Transcript Services of the Courts and Community Justice Division, as well as the Access and Privacy Unit of the Legal Services Division at the Regina Police Service. Thank you to both of them for their help.
However, there are still many things about this investigation that are missing from this story. Due to privacy and freedom of information laws, information about the 1985 forced entry into the mausoleum was redacted from the freedom of information report. Additionally, information about the Satanists interviewed and contents of anonymous phone-call that broke the case were also redacted. While I can understand they would be excluded as they weren’t necessarily relevant to the conclusion, the investigation into the University of Regina Fine Arts Department wasn’t redacted and was if anything just comedic relief. One day I might put in an additional freedom of information request to learn more about the 1985 event, but that’s a story for another time.
I also want to make a public service reminder that breaking into the mausoleum is against the law, and that the bylaw has changed greatly since 1988. Under Bylaw No. 2008-27, this type of offense opens you up to a fine no more than $2,000 or a 90-day prison sentence. As well, the The Public Health Act, 1994 also has a stipulation against unauthorized disinterment of graves, which would be no more than $75,000 plus $100 per day the offense continues (in Pasap’s case, that would be 14 days, or an additional $1,400). As well, indignity to a dead body is also against Section 182 of the Criminal Code and the punishment varies between a $5,000 fine or up to 5 years in prison. Simply put, please don’t consider doing what Pasap did.
I would like to end this by also thanking the folks over at Darke Hall who helped me with this story and for keeping the legacy and legend of the Darke Family alive. For more information about Darke Hall and their programs, please visit darkehall.ca or read my recent article about the recent rebranding of the Darke Hall Society.
Have you heard about this crime or of a similar version of the events? I’d love to hear about it, so let me know in the comments below.
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Categories: Canada, Dark Tourism, History, Paranormal, Regina, Saskatchewan
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