I was searching the Internet for stories about an Alberta Heritage project I helped renovate when I came across this story fragment.

Lougheed House mischief trial set" A trial will begin Nov. 28 for a woman charged with vandalizing the historic Lougheed House. Provincial court Judge Anton Demong set the date Monday for Melissa Dawn Powell, 30, who faces one count..."- Tue, Apr 19, 2005

I took this picture of Melissa (crouching in front) on her birthday. These are some of the crew who scraped and replaced the woodwork throughout the Home.

This is an archive picture of the original House. It was built in 1891 and is the first Mansion built in Calgary. This is the East view Of Lougheed House.
I was very interested to read that someone had been arrested for this crime because I probably know more the evidence of this crime than anyone else. I was the first one on the scene after the vandalism was done and I took pictures that no one has ever seen until this Blog. I have always thought there were certain elements to the vandalism that were suspicious. But I also want to make it clear that Melissa has not been convicted of this crime and I only know what the papers have said about her arrest so I will not assume she is guilty. I will show you the evidence from that day and tell you my thoughts about it.
I was the lead carpenter on the Lougheed Mansion when the break-in happened. I was working alone in Lougheed House until 5:30pm, Saturday July 23rd. I was also the first one to go inside at 7am on Monday July 25th.

Here's how the person got into the yard. They didn't break in. They simply pulled the fence apart. I was the only one to get this picture. This created a minor scandal because we had security guards patrolling the perimeter (theoretically) but they never reported anything unusual even though the fence was so obviously out of whack. The upside was that we had full time security guards onsite from that day on.

I figure the person got in through the window that you can see in the center of the picture here. They could get up there by pushing off from the wall and climbing in the window which was not locked at the time.

They came through this window to my boss's office. I took this picture before anything was moved. As you can see, the office was filled with blueprints and papers and yet it was left undisturbed. You would think the perp would want to trash this room. There were cans of paint just outside the door but none were thrown into the office. The only damage done here was the breaking of the mirror. In fact this person broke five mirrors. But they didn't hit the woodwork. Now here's something that really made Melissa a suspect in my boss's mind. Tom told me that Melissa had popped her head in his office on Friday afternoon and asked him something about his window; something like: "is it locked?". But if you were planning to break into a building would you check with the boss?

This is the door to the Portico on the North side of the building. The perp broke the expensive glass insert with a crowbar but didn't touch the woodwork of the door. Keep in mind that Melissa's crew stripped the wood on that door and rehung it but another trade was responsible for the glass. It might make sense that a person on the crew might not want to damage their own by destroying it with a crowbar.

And here's another mirror that was busted over a mantle on the second floor. Just think of it. If you just wanted to break some stuff, why not hit the woodwork too? It's almost harder NOT to hit the wood.

Okay, here's something that really made we wonder. The vandal didn't throw any paint in the office that was right beside the cans. Instead they hauled the cans all the way upstairs to the second and third floors and threw them into various rooms. This was a lot of very focused work. It would be hard for a person to even find the entrance to the third floor without knowing the building. I couldn't see kids doing just for a prank because it's so much work.

We couldn't figure out why a person would throw paint stripper over this hallway. Then one of Melissa's coworkers came up with a possible reason. Lois reasoned that the stripper might have been thrown over the footprints that were left when this person walked through their own mess to escape. The stripper was to hide the tracks.

The only thing that about that theory is, the perp left their footprints on one of the painted hardwood floors on the third floor ; perhaps forgetting to erase them?

Now here's another very strange thing. Our crew left a compressor sitting out all weekend. But look how the paint was thrown all around it, but not on the compressor. This person has so many opportunities to damage things in the house but didn't. The Perp was walking around with a crowbar but didn't bang up the woodwork. The They were holding a can of paint but didn't' throw it on the tools.

The strongest element of the vandalism was the attempted water damage. This person pulled down a radiator on every floor in hopes of breaking the pipes so that the floors would be flooded. The rad and the Tub on the third floor were knocked over. A rad on the second floor was dumped. A rad on the main floor was dumped too; but no water. The water lines were turned off at the time. The only water that was on in the house was in the washrooms in the basement.

I entered the basement at 7am Monday morning, and I heard a hissing sound. The sound led me to the washroom sinks. They were stuffed with rags and the faucets were turned on full blast. All four sinks were full of water, but the overflow drains were keeping the water from spilling over.

there was a bag of concrete powder dumped in the exit hallway just outside the washrooms. If the water had overflowed, the concrete would have been rock hard by the time I arrived, had the sinks overflowed. The vandal left this footprint on the concrete powder on their way out the door. The police didn't have a chance to see this footprint because we cleaned up the hallway before they arrived in the afternoon. What's really strange is that this was the only door that a person could exit from without having a key. This was one of the strongest reasons I had for believing it was an inside job.
The big question is why would Melissa do it? She had been sent recently to another site because their had been complaints about her work ethic and that she was distracting other people and keeping them from doing their jobs. She might have been upset that she was sent away and done the damage in retaliation but I don't see it. I always found Melissa to be a very sweet person. She never gave me any indication that she would want to get even with anyone.
There's another possible motive that is even stranger to me. Melissa told me she was having a secret affair with the foreman of her crew. They had broken up a couple of times and it is possible she might have done it to get back at him, if they were having a fight; but I don't think so. If I'm not mistaken, her alibi for that Saturday when the damage was done, was that she was out of town, camping with her lover on that day. On the other hand, why would she give that as her alibi, knowing that he would contradict her later?
This leads me to one other theory. What if Melissa did this vandalism to create more work for her company and make her lover a bunch of extra money on the job? She could then tell the police that she was with him, out camping and he would lie to them and say it was true. But there are two things wrong with this theory. First of all, Her company was already backlogged with work. They were trying to get out of Lougheed House so they could get to some other projects that were already late starting. And the thing that really makes me doubt this theory is the attempted water damage. I think Melissa and her boss were both aware that the water in those upper floors was turned off. The person who dumped the rads over was trying to create water damage and didn't know the lines were off.
Perhaps someone following this story in Calgary Alberta can send me more details on this case. I have only been able to access very little from the press online so far.

This Page Edited Monday, January 07, 2008