The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
A 24-year-old former Thompson man has been arrested and charged with second-degree murder in connection with the slaying of 16-year-old Chantelle Rikheim in the old Burntwood Trailer Court in Thompson seven years ago. The suspect cannot be identified under the provisions of the Youth Criminal Justice Act because he was 17 at the time of the Feb. 2, 2005 murder. The man is a federally-sentenced prisoner on an unrelated matter, RCMP said Feb. 10, serving time at the Saskatchewan Penitentiary, a medium-security prison in Prince Albert opened in 1911. There are more than 600 prisoners being held at the Saskatchewan Penitentiary and 22 per cent are serving life sentences, 41 per cent sentences of 40 months and over and 37 per cent less than 40 months, according to a Correctional Service of Canada Institutional Profile for the penitentiary. The accused will be transported to Winnipeg from Prince Albert to be arraigned as a remanded prisoner in custody in provincial court on the second-degree murder charge. At the time of her beating death, with blunt force trauma being the cause of death, RCMP said, Chantelle Rikheim was living with her dad, Carl Rikheim, in a trailer in the old Burntwood Trailer Court. He was at work at Inco when she was killed in the early morning fire. The fire was so intense it took RCMP forensic investigators almost a week to positively confirm Chantelle's identity through dental records. 'My daughter Chantelle Rikheim was at a point in her life where she was on the verge of becoming a responsible adult,' Carl told the Thompson Citizen Jan. 31. 'She was doing very well at her job at Santa Maria Pizza and she had lots of friends. I will never stop missing her. The only thing that has kept me going this long is finding the person responsible and getting justice as well as closure. 'All I can tell you is Chantelle was murdered and the trailer, our home, was set on fire to cover the murder. Chantelle was a very beautiful young lady with her very own personality. I know I am not the only one who misses her. My heart also goes out to Mr. Jim Brown and the Chaboyer family.' Chantelle was also involved with the Futures Family Resource Program at 125 Commercial Place. Futures provides a safe place and other services to at-risk children and youth in the Thompson area. At one point, almost 50 Mounties worked on the Rikheim case, analyzing forensic material and DNA samples. RCMP refuse to officially use the term 'cold' case, as such old murder cases are known in television and movie popular culture, and in some police jurisdictions, preferring the more neutral term 'historical' cases, although the public and media almost invariably continue to refer to them as cold cases. Only murders that are unsolved still after five years qualify as 'historic' cases with the RCMP. Even with the arrest in the Chantelle Rikheim case, there remain at least six other unsolved murders in Thompson since October 1986. _ John Barker, Thompson Citizen
