Case reference: #08-2682
Location: Saanich, British Columbia
Date of birth: November 2, 1983
Lindsay’s Date of death: February 2, 2008
Near the end of January 2008, Lindsay Buziak received a call from a woman who said that she and her husband were urgently seeking a home with a budget of $1 million. The caller had a foreign accent and offered what was later determined to be a fake name. Unnerved by the nature of the call, Lindsay asked the caller how she had obtained her personal cell-phone number, as she was a relatively junior employee. The caller claimed that one of Lindsay’s previous clients had shared it with her. She told Jason and her father about the call and told them about her concerns. Jason encouraged Lindsay to meet with the client because of the high commission that she would earn from the sale of the home. To reassure her, Jason offered to wait outside the property in his car in case anything should go awry. Lindsay found a suitable property and arranged an appointment with the client to view the home at 5:30 pm on Saturday, February 2, 2008.
Lindsay & Jason ate a late lunch at a restaurant, paying the bill at 4:24 pm. They left separately in their own vehicles. Lindsay appeared to have returned home to change her clothes before going to the viewing. Jason drove to an automobile repair shop to pick up a colleague, but he was running late. CCTV footage from the auto shop showed him leaving with the colleague at 5:30 pm. Jason & Lindsay exchanged several text messages and Lindsay was aware that Jason would be late.
The house was located on De Sousa Place, which is a small cul-de-sac with four houses. The house she was found in was Number 1702 at the outer end of the cul-de-sac, on the intersection of De Sousa Place and a main thoroughfare, Torquay Drive. The side of the property and the fence of the back garden run parallel to Torquay Drive. The caller had told Lindsay that she would attend the viewing alone, however a man and woman were there. At 5:30 pm, two witnesses saw a six-foot-tall white man with dark hair and a blond-haired woman between 35 and 45 years of age, wearing a distinctively patterned dress, walking up the cul-de-sac. The witnesses saw Lindsay greet and shake hands with the couple in a manner that caused witnesses to feel that she did not know the couple. Lindsay and the couple then entered the house.
Jason and his colleague arrived at the cul-de-sac at about 5:40 pm. As they were driving to the property, Jason saw a figure through the glass of the front door. He parked outside the property for about 10 minutes and then drove to another street to wait, as he did not want to be “a nosy, interfering boyfriend.” After waiting another 10 minutes, Jason texted Lindsay to confirm that everything was okay, however Lindsay never opened the message.
20 minutes had passed since Jason had arrived and seen the couple go back into the house, so he went to the front door and found it locked when he tried to open it. Through the mottled glass on the front door, he saw Lindsay’s shoes in the entrance hall, but there was no sign of movement and no one answered his repeated knocks at the door. He then called 911. While Jason was on the phone with the operator, his colleague found a gap in the fence in the back garden, entered the garden and saw that the back patio door was wide open. He called to Jason, who told the operator that the two men were entering the house. Jason then ended the phone call.
Jason’s colleague walked through the main level of the house to unlock the front door in order to let Jason in, who immediately ran upstairs and found Lindsay lying in a pool of blood in the master bedroom. Jason made a second call to 911 and emergency services arrived soon after.
Lindsay was pronounced dead when the paramedics arrived. She had been stabbed multiple times. There were no defensive wounds, indicating that it was likely that she had first been stabbed from behind and had no indication of what was about to happen. None of Lindsay’s possessions had been stolen and she had not been sexually assaulted.
Jason and his colleague were taken into custody but were released without charge after their version of events was verified and the timestamped surveillance footage from the auto shop proved that they could not have committed the murder. According to the Saanich Police Department, Jason has been interviewed several times over the years and has always cooperated with the police. He has also passed a polygraph test.
Because the crime scene yielded no DNA, fingerprints or any other physical evidence, it is believed that the murder was planned and executed by people who had killed before. The police believe that the killers were leaving through the front door when Jason first arrived at the property and then fled through the back door, leaving the back patio door open and passing through the fence and to their vehicle on Torquay Drive. This scenario is consistent with the witnesses’ statements that the unknown couple were walking, not driving, up the cul-de-sac, and the fact that the owners of all of the vehicles in the cul-de-sac were confirmed.
The cell phone used by the unknown woman to call Lindsay was purchased in Vancouver several months before the murder and had never been used until the call was placed. It was activated under the name of Paulo Rodriguez, which authorities believe to be a fake name. It was registered to a legitimate business address in Vancouver, but it is believed that the business has no connection with the case and that its address was simply chosen at random. The phone was deactivated soon after the murder and has not been used since. Cell phone tower “pings” show that the phone travelled on the ferry from Vancouver the day before the murder. Authorities believe that the phone was used for the sole purpose of the murder and was discarded afterward, which supports their theory that the murder had been carefully planned.
Jason’s family were investigated because of their connections with the cul-de-sac. De Sousa Court is named after developer Joe De Sousa, a friend and business associate of Shirley Zailo, Jason’s mother. Part of the cul-de-sac was still under construction at the time of the murder, and De Sousa was at the location an hour before the murder, supervising the construction work. However, the police have stated that no one in the Zailo family is a suspect.
In September 2010, NBC aired a Dateline episode titled “Dream House Murder.” Saanich detectives revealed that in December 2007, about eight weeks prior to her murder, Lindsay tried to contact the friend of her ex-boyfriend while on a visit to Calgary. On January 22, 2008, the largest drug bust in Alberta’s history took place and the friend was arrested, accused of being a major participant in the drug-trafficking operation. It was speculated that Lindsay’s murder may have been ordered by a drug cartel because she was believed to be a police informant. The detectives investigated that possibility but quickly eliminated it as a motive because Lindsay was not an informant and the personal nature of her murder did not fit a hired killer’s method of operation. Crime scene investigator Yolanda McClary and veteran homicide detective Dwayne Stanton agree that Lindsay’s murder was not a contracted operation related to a drug cartel, as it was brutal definitely not professional. The investigators believe that Lindsay’s murder was very personal and had likely been planned by someone close to her, perhaps by someone who had access to inside information from the real-estate office that she worked at.
There was also speculation regarding another drug bust that had been investigated as a link to Lindsay’s murder. One man’s phone had been tapped because of his high level of involvement in the trafficking and sale of narcotics in British Columbia and Alberta. During the wiretaps, law enforcement uncovered information that led to the BC Legislature raids in 2003. Lindsay’s and her boyfriend’s phones had also been tapped because of his association with the group. However, the theory was quickly dismissed because Lindsay had no known involvement with drug use or trafficking and was not included in the defense’s witness list during the trial.
Later in 2008, Nikki, a close friend of Lindsay’s, claimed that she had been awakened by a telephone call in the middle of the night from an unknown number. She did not remember much of what the female caller had said, but she noticed that the caller had a strange accent that she could not place. She became scared when she remembered that Lindsay had reported that her unidentified client (and possible murderer) spoke with an odd accent that she believed may have been fake. After the phone call, Nikki called the originating phone number “20 or 30 times” until the call was answered by Shirley Zailo. Nikki asked Shirley why she had called her and how she had her number, as they did not know each other. Shirley replied that she had intended to call her secretary, also named Nikki, and that she did not know why the other Nikki’s number was in her contact list. She had assumed that her son Jason must have added it. Shirley denies that the event occurred, and it has not been publicly revealed whether Nikki’s claim was investigated by the authorities.
In February each year, Lindsay’s father Jeff leads an annual walk in remembrance of her and to keep her case in the public eye.
In August 2017, a comment was posted on a message board at the investigative website run by Jeff Buziak stating: “I killed Lindsey and stupid cops will never prove it.”
In 2020, the Capital Daily requested a release of public records relating to the case and reported previously unpublished information. The documents revealed that police had been aware of two phones used by the suspects. One with a Vancouver number only used to contact Lindsay and another used to check the voicemail of the first phone. The information revealed there had been unusual Internet activity associated with Lindsay before her murder, and that police initially suspected that “violent criminals” on her Facebook friends list “may have played a role” in the murder.
In February 2021, a new task force, including the FBI and RCMP, was formed to leverage advances in DNA and genealogy technology.
Public concern arose after reports that the original detectives were reassigned in November 2025. However, the Saanich Police Department clarified that the investigation remains active and ongoing, stating that periodic reassignments are standard practice.
If you have any information on Lindsay’s case, please contact any of the following:
Saanich Police: (250) 475-4356
Case reference #: 08-2682
Crime Stoppers: 1-800-222-TIPS(8477)
Online at: https://www.canadiancrimestoppers.org/submit-a-tip/submit-a-tip
Crime Stoppers provides anonymous tipping
Sources: Saanich Police Service, The Times Colonist, Lindsay Buziak Murder dot com, CTV News, Capital Daily, National Post
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