Dec. 5th 1975 Jewish News:
By SHELDON KIRSHNER CJN Staff Reporter TORONTO She was 16-years old, weighed 98 pounds, was just under five feet tall and, by her Own admission, was a flirt as well as a sentimentalist. When Max Peters thinks of her today, his dark handsome face sags like that of a ravaged old man, and his mind performs an instant replay of the horrors of the Holocaust. Peters, Who lost part of his family in the last world war. is profoundly aware that the cold-blooded murder of his daughter was not only an act of random cruelty but a foul deed of supreme irony. As a youth, he survived brushes with death and overcame haunted, fearful days' and sleepless, hunger-filled nights. He knows that life is fickle and fleeting but never in his wildest nightmares could he ever imagine that Mariam Deborah, named after his mother who perished in a concentration camp, would be cut down in a city so far removed, in time and space, from the surrealistic death camps of Europe. "I've had a hard time in life and just when I started living like a human being this..." Mariam Peters died at the Toronto General Hospital last month, the 44th local murder victim of the yean She was stabbed 16 times on'the escalator of a deserted do w n t o w n subway station, and she succumbed to her severe wounds some four days later. Despite a $10,000 reward, the killer has not been found. Less than 30 days after her senseless death, Peters, a shopkeeper, is torn by a gnawing, corrosive guilt. Why is he alive when his Mariam is dead? For four terrible days and nights, as he; and his family waited and strained for encouraging news from the doctors desperately trying to save this frail girl, Peters was tormented by one thought which flashed through his brain like an electrical current. "1 kept asking God: why did you spare my life and take hers. I must have sinned so badly that my prayers were not accepted." he said, consumed bv remorse. Mariam Deborah Peters: typical teenager. Max and Merle Peters ponder the life and death of their older daughter. (El-Baz photo) Mariam's mother. Merle, a gentle woman of 38, refuses to martyrize her daughter. "She was a typical teenager growing up." she said simply, showing me a composition that Mariam wrote last February. Mariam described herself in a dozen adjectives: "sentimental, kind, nice, flirt, vivacious, outgoing, pleasant, good, compact, big mouth, ugly and lack of self-confidence." She wanted to be a social worker, her mother said, so she was actively involved in working with mentally disturbed children. Mrs. Peters disclosed that her clothes have been donated to the Canadian Association for the Mentally Retarded. According to Mrs. Peters, Mariam was on her way to visit her grandparents at Mount Sinai Hospital when she was assaulted. Her boyfriend of 10 months, Stephen, was to hiave accompanied her but he had a cold and remained at home. Merle Peters drove her daughter to the Finch stop of the Yonge subway line. It was . the last time she saw Mariam conscious. At 10:15 p.m., two Metro policemen knocked on the door of their WilloWdale Spanish-style detached home to tell them and their children. Jeffrey, 13, and Renee^ six, the sad news. The team of doctors operating on the grade 11 A. Y. Jackson student did not offer the Peters' much hope. Mariam had lost too much blood and a clot had formed on her brain. But they clung to hope. "We . prayed for a'miracle," the parents said. They even called the Lubavicher' rebbe in New York for spiritual solace, Mariam lingered on for about 96 hours, and at one point in the vigil she squeezed her mother's hand after Mrs. Peters pleaded with her to respond. The funeral service was held at Pride of Israel Temple and approximately 1,500 persons friends, relatives, fellow students and strangers attended. To Charles Sideritz. who has-driven a cab for 25 years, Mariam's funeral was the biggest he had ever witnesised. In his eulogy. Rabbi Harold Lemer advised the mourners "not to be occupied with what is beyond you. You may have' been shown more than you understand." The other night. Max Peters reflected on the; rabbi's words. "The way of God is not for us to understand," he said; echoing Rabbi Lemer's comment, and gazing at his wife. "Raising Mariam was like growing a tree," she said softly, tears in her eyes,"...she was a branch but I have to finish growing the other branches of the tree." She looked at Jeffrey and Renee. disconsolate but hopeful.
