THURSDAY
K A M L O O P S
THIS WEEK
Thursday, December 5, 2013 X Volume 26 No. 97 www.kamloopsthisweek.com X 30 cents at Newsstands
Helping victims with Denise’s story By Andrea Klassen STAFF REPORTER andrea@kamloopsthisweek.com
F
OR A YEAR AFTER KIMBERLEY McCart’s mother left her father, Kimberley and her brother weren’t allowed to play outside their Lloydminster home. Nor were they allowed to open the curtains, which stayed permanently drawn across the windows at all times. “I remember — because I was four and curious, I didn’t understand — peeking out the front window and my dad was sitting there in his car,” said McCart, now a legislative assistant with the City of Kamloops. “And I realized then, this is why we’re not allowed to look outside. Because something wasn’t right about that, even at four years old.” Over the course of that year, McCart said her father’s behaviour, already abusive when her parents separated, reached its most frightening level. “He followed her, chased her, he waited outside our home,” she recalled. “Every single day he was right wherever she was, threatening her.” The stalking continued until one day in August 1983, when McCart’s father walked into the law office where her mother, Denise Ellen Nault, was working as a legal secretary. “He had his gun and he shot around the office,” McCart said. “The lawyers were scrambling and she tried to stop him. She’d been dealing with his rage for so long that she thought she could calm him down.” Instead, McCart’s father shot her mother twice, point-blank, killing her three days before her 28th birthday. He would spend the next 15 years in prison, while McCart went to live with an aunt and uncle. Thirty years later and a province to the west, McCart will tell Denise’s story at this year’s Kamloops Shoe Memorial.
Kimberley McCart, whose mother died as a result of domestic violence, will speak at the Friday, Dec. 6, Shoe Memorial at St. Andrews on the Square. Dave Eagles/KTW
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