Prince George RCMP say some remains of an Indigenous homicide victim were found in a downtown park last month, 32 years after the woman was killed. On Wednesday, police identified the woman as Donna Charlie, who was 22 when she died. Family members say she is from Kwadacha, also known as Fort Ware, a remote community in northern B.C. Her remains were found in October in Connaught Hill Park, a popular wooded park above Prince George’s town hall. RCMP say Charlie was the victim of a homicide in 1990, when some of the woman’s remains were also found. “Although this initial investigation resulted in a conviction, it remained an open file with our Missing Persons Unit until the last of the remains were located,” said Prince George RCMP Cpl. Jennifer Cooper in a written statement. A missing person’s report for Donna Charlie was published in the Prince George Citizen in 1990. Her partial remains were found in 1991 in a shallow grave. (Prince George Citizen/Prince George Newspaper Archives) Gerald (Jerry) Schmaaslett was convicted of Charlie’s death after some of her remains were found in April 1991 in a shallow grave in the Ingledew Park area, a residential neighborhood a short walk from Connaught Hill. According to a BC Supreme Court ruling, Charli was reported missing after she left Quattacha seven months earlier with Schmaaslet, her boyfriend. Schmaaslett’s trial was told that he and Charlie had checked into a Prince George motel room. After checking out on his own several days later, the motel’s cleaning staff discovered bloodstains on the walls. At his trial in 1991, Schmaaslett told the court that Charlie died while outside at a convenience store. He said he and his nephew buried her body in a shallow grave near Ingledew Park, near the motel where she had stayed with Charlie. He told the court he also buried some of her remains in nearby Connaught Hill Park. Despite decades of testimony, Charlie’s remaining partial remains were only discovered this week. “Efforts were made then to recover [them] from Connaught Hill, but without a better description of where they were buried, police were unsuccessful,” Cooper told CBC News on Wednesday. Cooper said a member of the public recently “noticed something on the ground that he thought might be a human skull.” He said the BC Coroner’s Service was able to make an identification. Court records show Smaaslet was originally charged with first-degree murder in 1991, but was convicted of second-degree murder by a jury. This was overturned by the BC Court of Appeal and a new trial was ordered. In May 1995, Schmaaslet pleaded guilty to manslaughter in Charlie’s death. He was sentenced to one year on top of the 38 months he already served, plus two years of probation and a lifetime weapons ban. Smaaslet was later declared a dangerous offender after attacking several other women. In her 2007 ruling, Ms Justice Linda Loo said Smaaslet had a long history of violence against intimate partners. He noted that Schmaaslett had killed Charlie while on bail for inflicting “horrendous violence” on a 15-year-old friend, telling her that “all pretty girls deserve to die”.
