‘Words can’t express the pain,’ says family of James Smith Cree Nation murder victims

Forty-eight-year-old Bonnie Burns was a family matriarch, a foster mother, a community hero and a woman who did her best to take care of her family.

Her son, 28-year-old Gregory or “Jonesy” Burns, helped his parents while also providing for his family, and working to build homes on the James Smith Cree Nation.

Those were just some of the things their families told reporters at a news conference in Saskatoon on Wednesday.

The room, packed with media from across Canada and the U.S., listened intently to Mark Arcand who, as the family representative, spoke about what he heard, saw and knew of the deaths of his sister and nephew.

Arcand asked the media not to use his title because the news conference was about his family.

“How can somebody do this to women and children? Words can’t express the pain that we’re feeling,” he said, wiping away tears.

Arcand said when he learned of the deaths, he decided to go to the James Smith Cree Nation alone, but said it was the longest two hours he’d ever driven.

“When we got there, it must’ve been about one o’clock in the afternoon. This incident happened probably anywhere from six to seven in the morning,” Arcand said.

“My first reaction was to go see my sister and my nephew and touch her, and hold her. (I) couldn’t do that.”

He described speaking with a close family friend named Rhonda to try and piece together what happened. He found out his sister tried calling Rhonda, but she was asleep.

A second call was then made to another community emergency response member who made her way to the home to try and help, but was also killed.

“When (Rhonda) got there, our nephew, our son, was laying there. He was already deceased. He was stabbed, several times I believe,” Arcand said. “My sister went out and tried to help her son. I think she was stabbed two times and she died right beside him.

“The lady that came there to help was an innocent person trying to support their community, trying to help. And she died right there as well in the driveway.”

Arcand remained on the First Nation for several hours, but couldn’t go into his sister’s house because it remained an active crime scene. When he got home, his wife asked him how he was doing, and he thought he was OK.

“I tried to sleep that night and I woke up in the middle of the night just screaming, yelling. Because what I seen (sic) that day, I can’t get it out of my head,” Arcand explained through tears.

He called Gregory a “great kid” and said the family will always remember his sister.

“And that’s what we want people to remember,” he said.

The family’s next journey, he said, was to wait for the coroner to release the bodies of his sister and nephew, so they could spend a couple of days with them before they are laid to rest.

A GoFundMe has also been set up to help Bonnie’s three sons.