CANADA Canada - W. James Edwards, taxi murder, Ontario, 15 March 1948

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Driver Profiles

W. James Edwards

Pembroke, Ontario / March 14, 1948

Mr. Edwards, 35, was married with two small daughters aged four and two. He and his family lived small house on Norman Street which he had largely built himself. While on the night shift Mr. Edwards always returned home at midnight for lunch. His wife had his lunch waiting for him on the night he disappeared.

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Canadian Taxi Driver Homicides: W. James Edwards

Here is a list of taxi drivers murdered by date, city, name, etc.

Canadian Taxi Driver Homicides: Homicides by Date

This newspaper article mentions Westmeath Road and it was a cab murder.

Article clipped from The Ottawa Journal

Clipping found in The Ottawa Journal published in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada on 3/15/1948.

www.newspapers.com

 

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Canadian Taxi Driver Homicides: W. James Edwards

Main street of Pembroke, Ontario, in 1958. (Source: Todd Franklin, Neato Coolville)
''In December, 1948, police announced that they had arrested a suspect in the case, but he was freed after questioning and the murder remained unsolved.

A strange postscript came in September, 1971, twenty-three years after Mr. Edwards's death when a Toronto city gardener confessed to his role in the killing "so I can go to sleep at night"

The gardener, who was 17 years old in 1948, claimed that the killing was not a robbery but a "stupid accident".

''He and an older friend hired Edwards to take them out of town to a spot on the Ottawa River where they intended to stay overnight and shoot geese. The gardener had brought along his father's 20-gauge shotgun and a .30-30 calibre rifle.

As they reached the river the older man, sitting in front, asked to see the rifle and the gardener passed it to him from the back seat. As the older man reached for his money to pay the fare the gun went off.''