As of Jan. 14, it will have been 63 years since the skeletons of two children were discovered near Beaver Lake in Stanley Park. Dubbed the “Babes in the Woods” case, the story behind these deaths is just one of the fascinating mysteries that author Eve Lazarus examines in her new book Cold Case Vancouver: The City’s Most Baffling Unsolved Murders.

Q:Let’s start with the Babes in the Woods case. What for you is the most interesting part of this story?

A: The children were never reported missing and have never been identified. The story has become Vancouver’s own Hansel and Gretel fairytale. It shows a dark side to our much-loved Stanley Park that goes beyond the beaches, the forests and the seawall.

Q:I’ve heard it’s kind of a VPD thing, that if you can solve the Babes case then you truly would be the best detective ever. So why hasn’t it been solved?

A: When the skeletons were found in 1953, they were identified as a boy and a girl, and police spent nearly half a century searching for a missing brother and sister. It wasn’t until DNA became part of the forensic tool kit that police discovered that the children were brothers. The date of the actual murders is also uncertain. In those days, there was very little crime-scene analysis. A police officer snapped off a couple of photos, while another officer counted the leaves that covered the bones to determine how long they had been there. It was also post-war and there were a lot of transients and homelessness.

Q:According to your book, there have been 337 unsolved murders in Vancouver since 1970, so what draws you to a certain story?

A: Statistically, nine out of 10 victims know their murderers. I wanted to write about the one per cent who didn’t. The majority of the people in Cold Case Vancouver did not live high-risk lifestyles, they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I wanted the stories to be about them, not just about their murder, and I wanted to put the story into a historical context or, in other words, give the murder a sense of time and place.

Q:When was Vancouver the most dangerous? What was it about that time?

A: Post-war Vancouver was particularly violent towards women, children and gay men, and that lasted well into the 1970s. For instance, there were 18 murders in 1962. In 2013, there were six murders, yet Vancouver’s population had more than doubled. The good news is that we now have one of the lowest murder rates in North America, and there are a couple of theories for this. One is that we as a society are much less tolerant about violence in general — it’s no longer acceptable to “correct” your wife or slap your child in the grocery store, for instance. The other is simply demographics. Historically, the majority of murders are committed by males aged between 18 and 35. Today that group makes up far less of the overall population than it did in the 1970s.

Q:When you are looking at a story, and going through the facts, are you acting as a detective yourself? Would it be the best day ever if you could solve a case?

A: No, I’m being a reporter. The most I can hope for is that by bringing attention to these cold cases, someone may remember a detail that could help police solve them. And, yes, that would be the best day ever!

Q:What riles you up or disappoints you the most about unsolved cases?

That the family never has closure.

Q:Is there one case that you really wish would get solved?

A: Whoever murdered the two children in Stanley Park in the 1940s is likely long dead, but I would love to see the two little boys identified so that we can finally put them to rest.

Q:Have you watched Netflix’s Making a Murderer?

A: Not yet — it’s on my list.

Lazarus has started a Facebook public group page called Cold Case Canada (https://www.facebook.com/groups/ColdCaseCanada/) and hopes people will visit it to discuss unsolved murders. You can buy Cold Case Vancouver: The City’s Most Baffling Unsolved Murders for $21.95 through booksellers and online at Amazon and Arsenal Pulp Press.

dgee@theprovince.com