‘We are free’: Two sisters are starting anew — after decades in prison for a murder they say they didn’t commit

Odelia doesn't sleep well at home. She's used to the noise of halfway houses and of prison, not the quiet of a house.

Nerissa is overwhelmed by the list of appointments to keep: to update her ID, to meet her bail officer and to attend support meetings. This is the first time she's been free in three decades - since she was 18 years old.

The Quewezance sisters have physically left prison. But it will take a lot longer for either of them to move beyond what they say have been 30 years of injustice.

Odelia and Nerissa Quewezance were granted bail this week for a murder in Saskatchewan to which someone else has confessed.

Now, the two say, they want to help other unjustly imprisoned Indigenous women - two of whom are asking for medical assistance in dying.

I want to use my freedom to help other women suffering," said Odelia, 51.

The sisters would not be free without the support of the late justice advocate David Milgaard, who spent 23 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit, Odelia said in an interview before her release.

Odelia's longtime partner, Jay Koch, 62, reached out to Milgaard by email about three years ago, starting a judicial process that resulted in the sisters' conditional freedom last Monday.

The sisters were sentenced to life in prison in 1994 for the second-degree murder of Joseph Dolff near their home in Keeseekoose First Nation, a Saulteaux Nation in rural Saskatchewan, even though a younger cousin admitted at his trial that he - not the sisters - killed the 70-year-old.

Released after 30 years in custody, Odelia is happy as ever" to be living with Koch and their 15-year-old daughters at their home in Rhein, Sask., she said.

We are free," she wrote in a text minutes after the Monday verdict.

But integrating back into society after 30 years away is not easy, Odelia said. She doesn't have a driver's licence, needs a health card and is confused about places like banks.

I went to a bank and was looking around," she said. My ears just went red and I had to leave."

Odelia is also feeling acute financial distress since her release, she said. She is shocked by the price of food and women's products. Koch has not worked for the past 15 years - he has been caring for the twins.

Nerissa, 48, is living with Congress of Aboriginal Peoples vice-chief Kim Beaudin and his wife Rhonda. They are helping her adjust to her first experience of freedom since she was 18 - between residential schools and prison, the younger Quewezance sister has barely any experience living independently.

I don't think it has sunk in yet. (Nerissa) is sharing a lot of stories (of her trauma) with me," said Kim Beaudin.

Nerissa is scarred by memories of her childhood in residential school, surviving a miscarriage of justice and with the horrors of prison, including being confined alongside male inmates in a high-security facility for two years as punishment, he added.

The two other women (housed with the men) were illiterate and one committed suicide."

The federal Justice Department has started a review of the Quewezances' convictions last year, saying there may be a reasonable basis to conclude there was a miscarriage of justice. The sisters have been conditionally released while they await the review's results.

For now, they must abide by several conditions while released, including not speaking to witnesses from their 1994 trial, obeying a curfew of 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. and not leaving Saskatchewan.

It's harsh," said Rose Henry, Odelia's friend and mentor she calls Mama.

This family really needs a break ... and they can't escape the discrimination they face every day in their small community," said Henry.

The ministerial review for the sisters doesn't satisfy Kim Beaudin and Ontario Sen. Kim Pate, either; the latter told the Star there are other women whose cases deserve the same reconsideration.

Pate is one of the co-authors of a report, released last May, that identified 12 Indigenous women - all of them imprisoned now or in the past - who experienced miscarriages of justice. She says two of the women in the report are asking for medical assistance in dying because they believe they will never get justice.

I am quite desperate to get (them) out," because they are so isolated and traumatized, they have given up hope, Pate said.

There are many more cases of Indigenous women in custody that need help, said Pate and Beaudin. The same issues that give rise to the disappearance or murder of Indigenous women are the same issues that lead to them disproportionally criminalized and imprisoned, Pate said.

Pate has appealed for the elimination of mandatory minimum penalties, the elimination of overrepresentation of Indigenous people in prisons and for a conviction review process that recognizes racism, class bias and misogyny experienced by Indigenous women.

The sisters' release will give hope to other Indigenous victims of injustice, Beaudin said.

Odelia and Nerissa were not just fighting for their own freedom but for all Indigenous people."