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In August 2005, 25-year-old Alicia Ross disappeared from her family home in Thornhill, Ontario. What began as a missing-person investigation quickly became something much more serious when police arrived at the house and discovered a series of unsettling clues. Alicia’s car was still in the driveway. Her purse, phone and other personal belongings remained inside. Outside, investigators found the flip-flops she had been wearing and the wine glass she had been carrying when she said goodnight to her boyfriend. The positioning of those items immediately raised suspicion. They appeared to have been placed rather than dropped during a struggle, suggesting that the scene had been staged. Homicide investigators became involved almost immediately, and the investigation initially focused on Alicia’s boyfriend, Sean Hine, as well as a former boyfriend. Sean became the primary focus after his cell phone appeared to connect with a cell tower in Oak Ridges after he said he had gone directly home. Surveillance was conducted around the clock, his communications were monitored, and the media increasingly portrayed him as the likely killer.

But the investigation was going in the wrong direction.