Police on Wednesday linked eight more missing women to an area pig farmer accused of being Canada's worst serial killer.
Authorities say Robert Pickton is likely to go on trial next year on charges of first degree murder in the deaths of 15 of 69 prostitutes and drug addicts who have mysteriously vanished from this west coast city over the past quarter century. Police have linked Pickton to nearly half the missing women, and are appealing for help from the public in tracing the rest of the women on the list.
"We cannot solve these cases alone," said police spokeswoman Sergeant Sheila Sullivan, who said a new poster with all the women's names and photos will be distributed. Prosecutors have said they will also lay charges against Pickton in the deaths of seven other of the woman, and police said they've identified the DNA of nine other women on Pickton's pig farm, for a total of 31.
Three of the women discovered on the farm remain unidentified, and on Wednesday police repeated earlier pleas for families to report missing persons.
Pickton, a middle-aged, long-haired farmer was arrested in 2002 after police raided his property in Port Coquitlam, 35km east of Vancouver. He is to appear in court in December for a trial date to be set. All women on the list vanished over a 25-year period from Vancouver's downtown Eastside.
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