Vancouver Island has had a sordid past in many ways and one documentary series featured on CBC has taken a deep dive on some of those stories.
Taking inspiration from the rise of the true crime genre, showrunner and producer Geoff Morrison created the series Farm Crime and CBC gladly took him up on three seasons so far of stories that focus on agriculture-based crimes.
He wanted the format of the show to have a central storyteller in the form of a narrator who can move the story along and featuring snippets of interviews from people who experienced the crimes.
Morrison says the first time he paid any attention to a ‘Farm Crime’ was when he heard of a maple syrup heist that took place in Quebec.
“I just thought it was so incredulous that someone could steal an agricultural product worth that much money,” Morrison told Victoria Buzz.
“At the time a lot of the headlines were littered in puns like, a sticky situation, or whatever, and I just thought this is a really complex and complicated, fascinating crime that’s unfolding.”
When all others saw a quick joke and a one-off story, Morrison saw layers of involved organizations, government interest and at the heart of it, a farmer or producer that was victimized in a way they may not have thought possible.
Farm Crime is now in its third season on CBC and CBC Gem with a total of 18 episodes all-in-all, three of those episodes being based right here on Vancouver Island in Victoria, Coombs, Wei Wai Kum First Nation territory (between Campbell River and Comox Valley) and Nanaimo.
“I have spent a lot of time on Vancouver Island,” said the Toronto-based showrunner. “I honestly just love it and Victoria is probably one of my favourite cities in the country.”
Vancouver Island-based episodes
Season three of Farm Crime, which will be released this week on CBC Gem, features the Wei Wai Kum First Nation’s story of someone stealing sacred and protected old-growth red cedars from their land.
The Nation’s territory is a large portion of Vancouver Island’s eastern coasts as well as a chunk of the mainland and the fjords that extend inland.
The Wei Wai Kum Peoples have long been the stewards of both the lands and waters in that territory and beyond it, protecting the sacred resources their ancestors lived to protect and live in harmony with.
In this episode directed by Conor McNally, the Farm Crime crew follow the guardians as they relive their investigation of someone illegally entering their land and poaching old-growth red cedar trees from their land.
“I wanted to centre the importance of old-growth cedar to First Nations and I think in this case, this came across to me as such an egregious crime and such a horrible thing for the Wei Wai Kum to have to go through,” Morrison told Victoria Buzz.
“There’s a lot of layers to that story, but for there to be a resolution at the end, I think that’s part of what makes it a special episode.”
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Vancouver based-director Kathleen Jayme directed episode three of season three of Farm Crime.
This one hones in on Greater Victoria as well as Coombs to highlight the story of the feral bunnies which were abandoned on the UVic campus, hunted, relocated elsewhere, escaped and hunted once again.
This story puts a focus on the nuances of the perspectives that make up the narrative including the activists, the UVic faculty, the woman whose land the saviours of the bunnies and the woman who was vilified for hunting the bunnies who were meant to be safe.
“I have to credit Kat Jayme on this one because she did a great job putting the episode together and I feel like it comes across like a really balanced piece and that’s what we were hoping to achieve,” Morrison said.
This latest season isn’t the first time Vancouver Island has been featured on Farm Crime though.
In season two which went into production just before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the first Asian giant hornets, or ‘murder hornets’ were discovered in North American and happened to create a nest in Nanaimo of all places.
“It’s an amazing story of how these amateur beekeepers in a beekeeping club discovered the Asian giant hornet, used their smarts to pinpoint the location of the nest, consulted with the Province and found a local, defensive insect specialist to go out and try to eradicate the murder hornet nest,” explained Morrison.
“I feel like people on Vancouver Island and Nanaimo should be very proud of the efforts of these beekeepers,” he continued.
These episodes take about two to three months of research and finding connections then about nine months in active production, says Morrison.
He has directed four episodes and has a hand in the writing of all the episodes, but he also gladly takes a step back and lets the directors he works with take the story in the direction they wish.
Morrison isn’t sure what’s next aside from keeping busy trying to have his series find an audience inside and outside of Canada and he says he has been also working on a project based in Toronto on a feature-length documentary highlighting the use of public space.
Seasons one and two of Farm Crime can be found on CBC Gem to stream for free with the third season’s release date being November 3rd.
