Bobby Jack Fowler, he was a drifter, a drinker and a suspected serial killer.
Bobby Jack Fowler has been identified by RCMP officers working on Project: E-PANA as a possible suspect in the murders of several young women along BC Highways in the 1970’s, 80’s and possibly the ‘90’s. He died in prison in the United States in 2006, he was 66 years old.
This morning Inspector Gary Shinkaruk confirming Fowler murdered 16 year old Colleen MacMillen, of Lac La Hache, BC, in 1974. The “lovely, sweet, innocent” girl left home one night to visit a friend. She walked up to Highway 97 and wasn’t seen again until her body was found down a logging road near 70 Mile House, BC.
Fowler was a general labourer and roofer who worked for Happy Roofing in Prince George in 1974. The company and its records no longer exist. Fowler lived in rentals or motels and drove old cars. He frequented bars and restaurants, and was violent to both men and women. Insp. Shinkaruk saying Fowler believed women who frequented bars wanted to be sexually assaulted.
He was transient and sometimes travelled between Canada and the United States in one day. He was known to pick up hitch hikers.
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Police in several American states were familiar with Fowler. His record included attempted murder, assault with a dangerous weapon, sexual assault, kidnapping, arson and firearms offences. He had no record in Canada. The only way he came into focus as a suspect in any BC murders was through a DNA hit in 2012. RCMP working on cold cases, resubmitted DNA from the Colleen MacMillen murder to Interpol, which accesses DNA banks from several countries and that’s when they got a match to Fowler.
There is a stretch of time in which Fowler was not “on police radar” in the U.S. and that leads investigators to believe he may have been in Canada. Today RCMP saying Fowler might also have been involved in the deaths of Gale Ann Weys and Pamela Darlington. Both women were 19 years old when they went missing in 1973. Weys disappeared October 19th while hitchhiking from Clearwater, BC, to Kamloops, BC. Her body was found April 6, 1974, just off Highway 5. Darlington went missing from Kamloops, BC, November 6, 1973. She was last seen in the company of a man at the David Thompson Pub. Her body was found the next day in the South Thompson River.
Police in Oregon have also identified three other cases in their state in which Fowler might be a suspect.
If you know anything about Bobby Jack Fowler you’re asked to call police at 1-877-543-4822.
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