'This isn't just my mom's story,' says daughter of woman allegedly killed by partner

Abigail Robson says she moved from Nova Scotia to Alberta as a young girl with her mother 10 years ago for a fresh start.

"But I think for her, it was a bit harder coming from such a small town," Robson said of her mother, Ashley Burke, in a recent interview.

"Did we get a fresh start? Yeah. But did it end how I think we both wanted it to? No."

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Burke was one of two women in Alberta who police say were killed by their intimate partners in the final days of 2024. Her body was found on a bank of the North Saskatchewan River in Edmonton on Dec. 30.

"It's important to tell my mom's story because this isn't just my mom's story," Robson said. "This has happened to many other women."

'My mom thought it was shameful'

A detective told Robson the news over the phone on Jan. 2, shortly after she returned from spending the holidays in Nova Scotia.

He began with an apology for having to deliver the following information this way.

"Then, I knew what had happened," Robson, 20, recalled.

She says her mom was both "a typical east coast kind of person" – friendly, funny and generous – and someone who in recent years had struggled with substance abuse and mental illness. It wasn't uncommon for Robson not to hear from her mom for a few days. They last spoke on Christmas Eve, when Burke turned 43.

"There were a few, obviously, warning signs throughout the last few months, but in that conversation, not specifically anything that stands out to me," the daughter said.

According to her, Burke's husband is incarcerated. She lived in Spruce Grove up until a few months before her death, when she moved in with the man accused of murdering her, Daniel Boothman, in Edmonton.

Although Robson accepts the police label of "intimate partner homicide," she refuted on her mom's behalf that the relationship was romantic.

"For people to assume it was a loving relationship? No," Robson told CTV News Edmonton.

"Maybe he thought that, but that wasn't her perception of it."

Robson never witnessed her mother being abused by Boothman, but had heard "things" from other people. She also believes her mom had attempted to get help from social services.

"I know sometimes my mom thought it was shameful to talk to her daughter about," she said.

Abigail Robson with her mother Ashley Burke in an undated photo. (Abigail Robson)

But Robson feels different.

"My mom's not defined by these actions and these current life events," she told CTV News Edmonton.

"I truly do believe she did the best with her circumstances in the situation she was in and I can't judge her for things that she's done – and nobody else can either – because at the end of the day, she is a kind, sweetheart person and that's how she should be remembered."

Femicide an epidemic, says shelter system

On average, a woman is killed in Canada by a former or current intimate partner every 4.2 days, according to the Alberta Council of Women's Shelters (ACWS), which calls femicide an epidemic.

The breadth of the problem was especially visible during the holiday season.

A Saint John man is accused of murdering his wife on Christmas Eve. One day before Burke's body was found in Edmonton, a Calgary woman's husband killed her and her father. On New Year's Eve, a man killed his girlfriend and her father in Halifax.

"(My mom) always made it out of every situation she was in," Robson said. "And I think you can't always take that for granted."

Speaking about how unreal the situation feels, she added, "You never think it's going to be you – and then it does happen."

Although Robson helped her mom as much as she could, she is haunted by the feeling she could have done more and urged domestic violence survivors to continue seeking help.

"If (my mom) would have just given me a phone call or anything, I would have done anything to help her."

She saw her mom's body at the funeral home on Monday.

"All I could do is just hold her and hold her hand and give her a hug and say, 'I'm so sorry for all of this,'" Robson told CTV News Edmonton. "I'm still in shock. I don't believe any of this is real."

"She'd always call me eventually. So I'm like, 'Oh, my mom's still gonna call me back in a few days.'"

According to ACWS, demand for shelter space and the number of survivors that shelters do not have room for are both at 10-year highs, exacerbated largely by the pandemic but also factors like stagnant funding, inflation, staff burnout and high turnover. In the 2022-23 fiscal year, about one in six people needing help received it. The ACWS says it answers 46 per cent more calls than it did in 2015, but has three quarters of the spending power.

With files from CTV News Edmonton's Nicole Weisberg