u/snazzymacaronis

BACKGROUND: Tamra Jewel Keepness was born on September 1st, 1998. She had a twin sister named Tanis, along with her big sister Summer, big brother Raine, and three younger siblings. She and her her siblings and their mother Lorena Keepness are from the Whitebear First Nation in Saskatchewan. At the time of her disappearance, her siblings, Lorena and the children's stepfather Dean McArthur all lived on 1834 Ottawa Street in Regina, Saskatchewan. This area was not the nicest area for a family to live, as it was riddled with drug and alcohol abuse, sex work and poverty. Tamra's home was only five minutes away from a halfway house for felons, and not far from a Salvation Army shelter where the people that lived there, struggled with drugs and alcohol. Sasketchewan's Child Welfare services had been involved with this family since the oldest child (Summer) was born, in 1993. There had been over 50 reports made to child welfare services about Lorena neglecting the children, her use of drugs and alcohol, and Dean having a history of violence and domestic abuse. Between most of 2001 and 2002, Summer, Raine, Tamra and Tannis lived with their father Troy Keepness or their maternal grandmother. In early 2004, Troy was unable to look after the children, so the children returned to live with Lorena. Two weeks before Tamra's disappearance, Dean had been recently released from jail after beating Lorena while he was drunk.

July 5th, 2004 - last time Tamra is seen: There are conflicting stories about what took place the last time Tamra was seen. On the evening of July 5th 2004, Lorena and Dean were at home with all six of Lorena's children. At 8:30pm that evening they had an argument. Dean left the house and ran into his friend, Russell Sheepskin. Russell also occasionally lived in Lorena and Dean's home, as he would babysit the children. Dean and Russell went to a 7-11 to get a jug of milk for Dean and Lorena's baby (Dean and Lorena had two children together, one born in September 2003, the other born in December 2007.) After they dropped off the milk, Dean and Russell went to a bar to have a few drinks. Lorena on the other hand was at home, the children wanted to go to bed. Lorena says that Tamra went to her upstairs bedroom she shared with her brothers, who were 8 and 4 years old. Lorena left her oldest child 10-year old Summer in charge of the house, as Lorena went to a friend's townhouse, Lorena and her friend left the townhouse to get more drinks, Lorena came back to the house to let Summer know she was going back to her friends home and was going to give Summer the friend's phone number. When she got back to the townhouse, Lorena says she called Summer and gave Summer the phone number. Lorena states that it was around midnight when this exchange occurred.

July 6th - Tamra is missing: The second oldest child of all six of the Keepness/McArthur children, Raine Keepness shared the same bedroom as Tamra. He says he felt Tamra get up from the bed sometime possibly in the early morning hours of July 6th. Around 9am that morning, Lois Shepherd, the grandmother of all six children, showed up to the home. Lorena was recovering from a hangover. The two oldest children, Summer and Raine went to summer day camp. When it was time for breakfast, Tamra had not came down from her bedroom. When the family realized Tamra was not inside the home, they began looking at friend's and relatives homes, as well as playgrounds in the area. A family member called the police at 12:16pm that afternoon to report Tamra missing.Aftermath: Tamra's disappearance became national news throughout the entire province. Around 2,000 tips had came in, in the hopes of finding Tamra. There were searches coming in throughout the entire province alone, but she was not found. On July 19th, two weeks after Tamra was reported missing, police had arrested and charged Dean with assaulting Russell the night of Tamra's disappearance. Two days later on July 21st, Tamra's siblings were removed from Lorena's custody by child welfare services and they were never permanently returned to Lorena's custody after Tamra disappeared. Lorena had three children after Tamra went missing (one of the children was fathered by Dean) but they were also taken by child welfare services as well. Russell Sheepskin passed away New Years Day, 2009.
Troy Keepness, the father of Raine, Tamra, Tannis and Cole Keepness, did an interview with CBC in 2019. He says he is guilty of over losing custody of his children in the years leading up to Tamra's disappearance. He says the last time he saw Tamra, Tamra said she wanted to live with him. Troy has 10 other children who are all adults by the time the 2019 interview was done. One son of his, graduated high school. Tannis who is Tamra's twin sister, is in university.
In October 2022, her disappearance became the focus in two episodes of the show "Never Seen Again" which is a documentary series that explores the stories of missing persons. This show gives family members a chance to tell their story, as in her episode, Tamra's mother Lorena along with her siblings talk about their missing daughter/sister.
Lorena Keepness passed away in May of 2023 at the age of 49. Here is her obituary: https://www.speersfuneralchapel.com/obituaries/Lorena-Lyne-Keepness?obId=28865757
Summer Favel, Tamra's sister, went missing days before the 19 year anniversary in 2023, she was reported missing on June 14th 2023. However, police confirmed she had been found safe, days after she went missing. Here is the report that confirms she is safe: https://reginapolice.ca/2023/07/update-missing-29-year-old-summer-favel-located/
Cole Keepness, Tamra’s brother, was shot and killed in September 2023. Here is his obituary: https://www.speersfuneralchapel.com/obituaries/Cole-Keepness?obId=29104351
This year marks 22 years since Tamra’s disappearance. Tamra would be 27 years old if she is still alive, today. Here are some articles/reports on the disappearance of Tamra Keepness:

https://www.cbc.ca/news2/background/keepness_tamra/night.html

https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.6898091
https://thewalrus.ca/little-girl-lost/

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/tamra-keepness-anniversary-1.5199573
https://regina.ctvnews.ca/tamra-keepness-family-speaks-together-about-her-disappearance-in-new-documentary-1.6115084

Debra, Marc and Jacob Richardson

BACKSTORY: Jasmine Richardson was born on October 21st, 1993 to Marc and Debra Richardson. Marc and Debra met at a substance abuse recovery program in 1990 and married in 1991. A few years later, Jasmine’s brother Jacob was born. Although Marc and Debra previously suffered from addiction, they were dedicated to living sober and making sure their children had a stable home and a good upbringing. Jasmine’s parents would take her and her brother on outings to spend time as a family. They were the example of a perfect, suburban nuclear family: A mom, a dad and their two children. Jasmine came from a very tight knit family structure, from a middle class background. She was a typical preteen, she had a lot of friends & was a straight A student, who was involved in her school's fine arts program. However, she began to slowly change.

In the summer of 2005, Jasmine noticed a group of young people in the goth culture, who frequented the Medicine Hat Mall, where she and her friends would also hang out. Eventually Jasmine and her friends began hanging out with this group of young people that ranged in age from 12-21. Marc and Debra were not happy with Jasmine being friends with older guys. Jasmine became fascinated with the goth culture and one member in particular. At this time, Jasmine was also going through puberty and with her rapid physical development, she could pass for someone who was 15 to 18 years of age, or even a bit older, despite being only 11, turning 12 later on in the year. From August to December 2005, she made a few profiles on social media sites like Myspace, Nexopia and VampireFreaks.com, where she posted very risqué photos.

Jeremy Steinke was born in January 1983, to Jaqueline May. He lived in a trailer park with his alcoholic mother and his physically abusive biological father, who was also an alcoholic. He was also physically abused by two of his stepfathers. This type of unstable upbringing was ongoing in his home life. Jeremy had difficulties in school, was being bullied and at 14 years of age he started using marijuana and tried acid and magic mushrooms. By the 10th grade, he had dropped out of school. Jeremy’s life was filled with alcoholism and abuse, therefore he began to self harm by cutting himself, abusing substances and had attempted suicide. A close friend of Jeremy’s named Grant Bolt said that in the summer of 2005, Jeremy started to get into the goth lifestyle. It is also widely known that Jeremy has Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), which causes a person to have a lower mental age. Although he was 22 years old, his mental age was that of a 14 to 16 year old which would explain why he could relate and be friends with people of a much younger age than himself.

Desperate to belong somewhere, Jeremy began hanging out with the Medicine Hat Mall goth kids. Goth’s like Morgan, who was 14 when they became friends, and Kaylee, a troubled 13 year old who was a runaway and self harmed. Kaylee was actually a school friend of Jasmine, but she dropped out of school in January 2006. She introduced Jeremy to Jasmine. Around Valentine’s Day of 2006, is where things took a turn for the worse. Jeremy asked Jasmine to be his girlfriend and she said yes. Jasmine kept the relationship a secret from her family because she knew her parents would not approve, as she was a 12 year old girl and he was a 23 year old man. She constantly talked to him over the phone, on instant messenger and Nexopia. Unknown to her parents, Jasmine would meet Jeremy at the mall, have late night phone calls and sneak out to his trailer. When Jasmine and Jeremy's friends found out they were dating, they were less than happy. As a result of Jasmine acting out at school and leaving her brother Jacob alone in the home to go out with friends, Mark and Debra took away Jasmine’s computer and phone, and decided to go to counselling as a family.

Things started to get better in the home, and they decided to let Jasmine go to a punk rock show with one of her friends, but as a rule, Marc and Debra had to go along. During a break in this show, Marc and Debra were looking for Jasmine. After searching for a while, they found Jasmine in an alleyway making out with an older man wearing a black hoodie and dark makeup. That older man was Jeremy. As any other parents, Marc and Debra were very disapproving of this behaviour and Jasmine was grounded, her phone and computer were taken away. However Jasmine continued to disobey them by talking to Jeremy online. In April 2006, Jeremy & Jasmine’s relationship became sexual. This would considered a sexual assault crime by law in Canada in 2006, because the age of consent to sexual activity was 14.

Planning out the murders: After two months in their “relationship,” Jasmine and Jeremy started planning the killings of Marc, Debra and Jacob. Jasmine told Jeremy in a Nexopia message that she wanted to kill her family and live with him. Even though it was stated that it was Jasmine’s idea to kill her family, you can't help but speculate that it was mostly Jeremy’s influence as he was inspired by the movie “Natural Born Killers.” It could be stated that Jasmine was one of Jeremy’s victims in many ways, such as her and Jeremy being in a romantic relationship which lead to the murder of her entire family, and as she was 12 years old - a child, while he was a 23 year old man. Regardless if Jeremy has a disability or not, he surely knew that murder is wrong. Jeremy asked his friend Grant Bolt if he wanted to participate in the killings, but Grant declined. Another friend of Jeremy's, a homeless 17 year old named Jordan Attfield, was also asked by Jeremy if he wanted to participate and Jordan also declined, but did not alert anyone in authority.

April 23rd, 2006 - Debra, Marc and Jacob were murdered: On Sunday April 23rd, 2006, Jeremy Steinke stabbed Debra Richardson to death in the basement of the Richardson family home. When Marc went down to the basement after being alerted by Debra’s screams, he discovered Debra on the floor covered in blood. Marc jumped on Jeremy and started attacking him, but Jeremy was able to throw Marc off and stabbed him multiple times, killing him. Jasmine’s 7 year old brother Jacob was also stabbed to death, but it is unknown whether Jeremy or Jasmine killed him. The following day, Jeremy, Jasmine and their friend Kacy Lancaster were arrested in Leader, Saskatchewan.

Trial & Aftermath: In November of 2007, Jasmine was sentenced to 10 years, with credit for the 18 months she spent in custody, followed by four years in a mental health facility and an additional four years under community supervision. This process is known as “rehabilitation”, so that once she is released from her sentence she will be allowed back into society. During this time in her sentence, Jasmine was diagnosed with a conduct disorder. In the fall of 2011, she began attending Mount Royal University in Calgary during the final years of her sentence. She was released from a ten year sentence at a psychiatric hospital in the fall of 2011, and in October 2012 it was reported her rehabilitation was going well, and she expressed remorse for her actions that experts considered genuine. During fall of 2011 onwards, she lived in an apartment with a roommate and had a full time job. In May of 2016 she was fully released and given a new identity, and in 2020 her record was expunged. It’s also stated that Jasmine still lives in Calgary and works in healthcare/mental health sector. This was stated on this podcast with Mitch (renamed as Mick in the Runaway Devil book) as a guest. https://open.spotify.com/episode/1cIKYdwCTKiJsqBultRnIP?si=hepTFA5cRcyMcQ9ErzZbQA

In December 2008, Jeremy Steinke was sentenced to three consecutive life sentences, one for each first-degree murder count, with no chance of parole for 25 years. Jeremy was never charged with sexual interference, as he never admitted to having a sexual relationship with Jasmine. Jeremy has since changed his name to Jackson May - as a homage to his mother Jacqueline May who passed away in 2016. It is alleged that Jeremy got married in prison to a former school classmate and has had no contact with Jasmine since they were held in custody pre-sentencing.

Kacy Lancaster was charged with accessory to murder but it was dropped as she pleaded guilty to an obstruction charge. She received one year house arrest as part of the plea bargain and was prohibited from using alcohol and drugs.

Today marks 20 years since the murders. Rest In Peace Debra, Marc and Jacob Richardson.

Articles on the murders: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richardson_family_murders

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/jr-medicine-hat-murders-steinke-sentence-review-1.3568118