Manitoba premier promises search of landfill for remains of now identified serial killer victim ‘Buffalo Woman’
Posted March 26, 2025 9:06 am.
Last Updated March 26, 2025 3:51 pm.
The fourth victim of a Winnipeg serial killer had her name and identity restored Wednesday. Now her remains are left to be found.
Ashlee Shingoose, 30, previously known as “Buffalo Woman,” has been identified as the fourth victim of serial killer Jeremy Skibicki, three years after she disappeared and was murdered.
Shingoose’s remains are believed to be at Winnipeg’s Brady Road landfill. Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew is promising the landfill will be searched, an announcement that was met with applause at a press conference in Winnipeg Wednesday.
“I cannot promise you that we will bring her home, but I can promise you that we are going to try,” Kinew said.
The Winnipeg Police Service says it has already reached out to officials at the City of Winnipeg and Government of Manitoba to “start the discussions on a humanitarian search.”
“We are early in those discussions in terms of what a search would look like, but the Winnipeg Police Service is supportive of a search being undertaken and is committed to being part of those efforts,” Winnipeg police Chief Gene Bowers said.
“The initial decision not to search for the remains of Morgan Harris and Marcedes Myran has had significant impact on the families and community. We have had time for reflection, almost nearly three years. While we cannot undo the past, we can learn from it. Today we know what needs to be done.”
READ MORE: Search for remains must continue at Winnipeg-area landfill: Indigenous leaders
Bowers said a search of Brady would be different from the ongoing search at the Prairie Green landfill, where the remains of Harris and Myran were found, because of the “completely different environments.”
“There’s going to be a lot of different challenges in Brady than there were in Prairie Green,” Bowers said. “So we have to be cognizant of that and move forward carefully. We don’t want anyone getting hurt or injured or sick from it. So we’re going to have to take those different environments into account.”
Shingoose was from St. Theresa Point Anisininew Nation, a First Nations community in northeastern Manitoba.
In a letter read by St. Theresa Point Chief Raymond Flett at the press conference, Shingoose’s mother Theresa asked for the search to start as soon as possible. “It’s been a long time waiting. I need to bring her home. I need that closure. It’s been too long.”
“This new update, it brings me back,” added Shingoose’s father Albert, also in a letter read by Chief Flett. “It’s hard reliving the hurt.”
The parents later called into the press conference and thanked everybody involved.
Kinew says the province will “work together with all levels of government, including Indigenous governments and the Winnipeg Police Service, to do our best to bring your loved one Ashlee Shingoose home so you can memorialize her and honour her in the way that you see fit.
“I want every Manitoban to be safe, including Indigenous women, and every Manitoban will be safer when the police and the Indigenous community can work together and have trust in one another and put the shared interests of all people in Winnipeg and all people across Manitoba first and foremost.”
That message was echoed by Winnipeg Mayor Scott Gillingham, who said “every effort” would be made to bring Shingoose home.
DNA identification
Shingoose was last seen near a homeless shelter in Winnipeg in March 2022, where she met Skibicki, who brought her back to his apartment before killing her. Skibicki was convicted last year of first-degree murder in the slayings of Shingoose, Harris, Myran, and Rebecca Contois — four Indigenous women.
Contois’ remains were found in a garbage bin and at the Brady landfill in 2022.
Until now Shingoose was known as Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe, or Buffalo Woman, a name given by a group of Indigenous grandmothers.
Police previously provided few details about her. Skibicki’s trial heard DNA found on a cuff on a Baby Phat jacket was the only evidence police had pointing to her identity. More than 100 exhibits were taken from the killer’s home in attempts to identify the victim.
The trial heard that in 2023, police collected samples from Shingoose’s parents. One of those was sent to labs in February 2024 to gather more definitive information. It was determined her DNA was found on a cigarette butt collected from Skibicki’s home, but was not a match for the sample from the jacket, which Skibicki told police he sold on Facebook Marketplace.
WPS Deputy Chief Mackid confirmed Wednesday that’s because the sample taken from the jacket was not actually Shingoose’s.
“There was an indication in that initial statement that Ashlee had been wearing that jacket. We believe she was wearing that jacket,” Mackid explained. “Unfortunately, sometimes when you have a piece of clothing, there might be different profiles on it. Even though Ashlee was wearing it, which we’re confident of, there’s no guarantee that the DNA that we swabbed from that jacket was hers. It made sense, that’s the direction we went. We know now that DNA profile that came off of that jacket belonged to somebody else.”
But Mackid said a Dec. 17, 2024, post-conviction interview with Skibicki from jail shed a lot of light on the case, leading investigators to make a preliminary identification.
“With that interview, it gave us a direction and a specific item of clothing from her past that hadn’t been sent to the lab, that we were then able to send to the lab,” he said.
Authorities add the results identifying Shingoose came back on Monday. The next day, homicide investigators and a police family and support resource advocate travelled to St. Theresa Point Anisininew Nation to provide the “heartbreaking news” to Shingoose’s family and members of the community.
“Our hearts go out to Albert and Theresa Shingoose, Ashlee’s parents, and all the members of St. Theresa Point who received this unbearable news,” said Bowers. “Your daughter deserved to be named, and we offer our condolences.”
Mackid also explained why it took a post-conviction interview to explore new avenues.
“Unfortunately the way our legal system works, once we interview somebody once, we don’t get to ask them any further questions until they go to court, unless there’s new charges,” the deputy chief said. “So we would have liked to ask some follow-up questions of Mr. Skibicki to clarify some things.
“The post-conviction interview that occurred December 17 gave us the opportunity to ask the questions we wanted to ask for a long time, and it provided that level of certainty, that level of clarity we didn’t have before.”
Remains taken to Brady landfill
The post-conviction interview also led police investigators to believe Shingoose’s body was placed into a garbage bin behind a Winnipeg business on Henderson Highway in North Kildonan.
“Based on the timing of her death, and the new information about where she had been placed, the Winnipeg Police Service believes that her remains were taken to the Brady Landfill in March of 2022,” police said.
“This is another search that we have to take on for the Shingoose family,” said Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Grand Chief Kyra Wilson.
Another Indigenous woman’s family has long been calling for a search of Brady Road. Tanya Nepinak, who went missing in September 2011, has never been found, and her family believe her body could be at Brady. Winnipeg police searched the landfill for one week in October 2011.
“I acknowledge that the family of Tanya Nepinak, and I believe some of the family is here in the room,” said Grand Chief Wilson. “Of course this is a conversation that we do need to have. And what I will say today is we hear a strong message that we don’t leave anybody behind.”
Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak, the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, says Shingoose left her home on St. Theresa Point First Nation because of overcrowding.
Woodhouse Nepinak says she has spoken with the woman’s parents and offered her condolences. “My heart goes out to all the families of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.”
The chief is calling for an inquiry into the investigation of the women’s deaths.
“Why didn’t the police service help these families right off the bat, and why didn’t the previous provincial government want to help these families right off the bat,” Woodhouse Nepinak said.
–With files from The Canadian Press
