The search for a London Ont., woman who went missing in 2016 is being reviewed by a group of volunteers using cadaver dogs to search specific locations in the London area.
Shelley Desrochers, 42, was reported missing to police on the afternoon of Jan. 21, 2016, and was last seen in the area of Lorne Avenue and English Street weeks earlier, on Jan. 2, 2016.
“Shelly was known by a lot of people throughout that downtown core in London, and to just go from being an active member in that type of community to just nothing and not seen or heard from anywhere is concerning,” said Nick Oldrieve, founder and executive director of Please Bring Me Home.
Please Bring Me Home is a not-for-profit group of volunteers that works with the families of missing persons and law enforcement to gather information to help track down missing people.
The organization was founded in 2018 out of Owen Sound, Ont., to help gather new information about cold cases people don’t talk about anymore and has since grown to be Canada-wide. It consists of retired police officers, private investigators and regular citizens.
Oldrieve said that although they are keeping the areas and dates they are searching private, they found some areas of interest with the cadaver dogs after the first day.
“We will be working on further examining those locations. Nothing of immediate – like you couldn’t see any evidence, but the dogs were indicating an area which means that you have to look closer.”
Cadaver dogs are dogs that have been specially trained to locate human remains and decomposition.
The group is specifically looking at three areas of interest.
“These three areas are areas that are three completely different theories, three completely different pools of suspects. So we’re not just hyper-focused on one theory. We’re focused on many at the same time to make sure that we’re not getting tunnel vision,” Oldrieve said.
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He told 980 CFPL that the next steps are to notify the police in a report and then for the Please Bring Me Home forensic anthropology team to come within the next week to examine the locations more closely.
“All we know for a fact at this point is that we were led to this area to search for Shelly Desrochers, and cadaver dogs indicated areas of interest that need to be looked at closer. We don’t know if it has anything to do with Shelly, we don’t even know if that has anything to do with a current missing person or deceased individual, so we tailor our expectations,” Oldrieve said.
“It could be a big break in the case, or it also could be absolutely nothing but a debunked area.”
A post on the Please Bring Me Home website said that Desrochers had fallen into a troubled time in her life and struggled with substance abuse and PTSD before she went missing.
“There have been many theories about Shelley’s disappearance such as running off to start a new life, accidental death, and that she met with foul play due to her “high-risk lifestyle,” but these are still just theories,” the post read.
The website said police recovered Shelley’s purse in a home known for high drug-related activity, and her health card was found in the parking lot of a walk-in clinic on Hamilton road three years after she went missing.
“It wasn’t out of character for Shelly to be kind of quiet for a couple of weeks where nobody would hear from her. What is out of character is, you know, her belongings being found not with Shelly. That’s where things really took a turn, where you started to recognize that something had likely happened to Shelly,” Oldrieve said.
At the time she was reported missing, Desrochers was described as caucasian, five-foot-two, 130 pounds, with hazel eyes and long brown hair. Police say she had a distinctive walking style, described as being “pigeon-toed.”
Desrochers also had several visible tattoos, including a rose, a heart and a bluebird.
In November 2021, London Police said they found a person linked to Desrochers and another missing woman, Kathryn Bordato, 44, who was last seen in July 2009.
Police did not provide any further details at the time but did say the person – who has since died – was monitored closely and was believed to have withheld information from police.
Global News has reached out to Desrochers’ family and London police for comment.
Anyone with information about Desrochers’ disappearance can share it with the group on their website or by contacting the London police TIP Line at 519-660-5842 or anonymously through Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477.
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