Amber Kirwan: Pictou County's Angel
By Kate O'Dell
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About this ebook
In October 2011, nineteen-year-old Amber Kirwan disappeared after spending the evening at a downtown pool hall. She had walked a few minutes down the road to meet her boyfriend, but never made it. New Glasgow, Nova Scotia were terrified, and the community stepped up to search for Kirwan throughout Pictou County, plastering her missing poster everywhere they could.
After an exhaustive search, her remains were discovered a few weeks later on an old logging road a half hour from where she'd last been seen. She was naked, lying facedown in a shallow, muddy grave, clothing discarded in the bushes. She had been bound, stabbed multiple times, and had bled to death. The trial of her murderer, Christopher Falconer, became the most high profile trial the county had ever seen.
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Amber Kirwan - Kate O'Dell
INTRODUCTION
On October 9, 2011, a young nineteen-year-old woman named Amber Kirwan decided to spend a few hours getting drinks with her friends at the local pool hall. It was a Saturday night, and she was enjoying her evening at Dooly’s, which was located in downtown New Glasgow. Dooly’s Pool Hall, was located at 60 Archimedes Street, in downtown New Glasgow. It was part of the Dooly’s franchise – with other locations spread throughout the maritime provinces, as well as Quebec, and Ontario. It was sometimes also called Dooly’s Billiards.
What should’ve been just a simple night out with friends, became a nightmare for young Kirwan. At 1:30 AM, Amber was supposed to walk to Big Al’s, the nearby convenience store, to meet her boyfriend for a ride home. But Amber never showed up. Kirwan’s family, and her boyfriend contacted the police, and filed a missing person’s report.
For weeks, her boyfriend and family searched for her. The entire community rallied together, trying to find Kirwan, hoping desperately that nothing nefarious had happened to her. And in the beginning of November 2011, Kirwan’s remains were discovered in a shallow grave. It was devastating news. There were so many questions swirling around. Who could have killed her in such a grisly fashion? Why her? What had happened on that short walk from Dooly’s, to Big Al’s on October 9th? There were so many unanswered questions, as police investigated. Kirwan’s case officially went from a missing person’s case, to a homicide.
An arrest was finally made – a convicted murderer who had just recently gotten out of prison. Christopher Falconer, whose family lived in the area where Kirwan’s body was discovered, was charged with first-degree murder. In one of the highest profile court cases in Pictou County, Falconer pleaded not guilty to the murder charges. Despite having no witnesses to the actual crime, and no murder weapon, the crown put together a case against Falconer. After weeks of testimony from dozens of experts, police, friends, and family members, Falconer was given a twenty-five-year sentence.
To my knowledge, I have never met Amber Kirwan. I did, however, live for a number of years in both Stellarton, and New Glasgow. Residents in both towns are very interconnected through friendship circles, and large family trees, that a great deal of residents know each other through the degrees of separation.
It is totally possible that during my years living in both towns, I may have met Amber Kirwan briefly. Playing with the dozens of friends at the Albion park, watching a game at the baseball diamond, or sledding with kids of all ages on a snow day. It is highly possible, though it is something I will never know for certain.
When Amber Kirwan first disappeared, I was temporarily living outside of the province. The news of the missing Pictou County teen stunned me. In all the years I had lived in Nova Scotia, there had been few large crimes, and only one murder that I could recall. That murder had been difficult on the community, and people reacted by banding together in times of grief, and trying their best to show support for a deceased woman that many had never met in person. This was true for the Kirwan case as well. Amber Kirwan was a omplete stranger to me. She was four years my junior, and I had never even attended school at the same time as her. And yet, when the news broke, I felt fear and anxiety, and dread about the girl’s disappearance. I wanted so much for her to be found safe, to be returned to her boyfriend and family.
Tragically, that was not the case. The very idea that anyone could have gone after the young teen in such a brutal manner, still deeply upsets me. As terrible as it was that Kirwan would never return home, it was a small relief to know that her friends and family would be able to lay her to rest. And that there would be justice for what happened to her.
Though I didn’t know Amber Kirwan, I did know some of her friends, and even a few of her cousins. As I investigated this story further, a few familiar names came up in regards to witnesses, or people who gave testimony at