The Tragic Story Behind Hulu's Under the Bridge

The Tragic Story Behind Hulu’s Under the Bridge

Welcome to MsMojo, and today we’re discussing the true story of Reena Virk’s murder.

The Troubled Life of Reena Virk

Reena Virk was born on March 10, 1983, in Saanich, British Columbia, Canada, the eldest of Suman and Manjit Virk’s three children. After converting from Hinduism, the Indo-Canadian family raised their kids as Jehovah’s Witnesses, enforcing strict rules like not celebrating birthdays or certain holidays. According to family and peers, she was tormented at school over her weight, appearance, and religion, among other things. Reena began to rebel and started hanging around with teens who were into gang culture.

In 1996, convinced that living in foster care would grant her freedom to do whatever she wanted, Virk alleged that she was mistreated by her father. She went to live in the Seven Oaks youth home where she met Nicole Cook and Missy Grace Pleich, girls her age.

Despite her shy and insecure demeanor, Reena Virk tried to be “tough” like her new friends. For unknown reasons, she spread rumors about Cook, criticizing her looks and making up lies. Pleich also accused her of being intimate with her boyfriend. The girls, along with Cook’s best friend Kelly Marie Ellard, who was seemingly unacquainted with Virk, wanted to get her back, so they concocted a plan.

The Night Under the Bridge

On November 14, 1997, Reena Virk planned to spend the night at her parents’ home. By then, she’d rescinded her accusations against her father and the charges were dropped. However, she later chose to go to a party Missy Pleich invited her to. It took place on the field of Shoreline School, though police quickly broke up the crowd there and the party was moved underneath the Craigflower Bridge.

It’s there that Nicole Cook said she confronted Virk about spreading false rumors and then burned her with a cigarette. Others at the party started attacking Virk until one aggressor called for everyone to stop and the crowd dispersed. Left with severe injuries, Virk got up and began to stumble home. While everyone else left, two people who’d joined in on the initial attack, Kelly Ellard and Warren Paul Glowatski, followed her and the violence continued. It was said that Ellard then held an unconscious Virk underwater while Glowatski did nothing.

Search & Discovery

The day after the attack, Missy Pleich, Nicole Cook, and Kelly Ellard returned to the scene. However, the details of their accounts differ. According to Cook, Ellard didn’t act like she’d committed a murder because she, to Cook’s knowledge, hadn’t. Pleich, on the other hand, said Ellard actually described what happened the night before and that Cook took home Virk’s shoes, which had been left behind. Along with everyone else who knew what had occurred, they went on with their days as if nothing happened. Meanwhile, rumors of a fight and a possible murder spread around area schools. But none of the students or adults who heard about it brought the information to the police.

When their daughter didn’t return home that Friday night or the next morning, Suman and Manjit Virk filed a missing person’s report. But Reena had a history of running away. A week later, police arrested the eight attackers and, through interrogations, found out where to start their search. On the morning of Saturday, November 22nd, eight days after Reena Virk’s death, a helicopter spotted a body in the Gorge Inlet.

The community was shocked to see that seven of the attackers were girls. In addition to Pleich, Cook, and Ellard, three others including Nicole Patterson, Courtney Keith, and Gail Ooms were charged with assault. Kelly Ellar and Warren Glowatski are considered separate due to their actions after the first assault but the remainder of the perpetrators, plus one more unnamed girl, are known as the Shoreline Six. It’s been reported that none initially expressed any remorse.

A Long Road of Legal Proceedings

Between February and May of 1998, six of the girls pleaded guilty to assault causing bodily harm and received sentences ranging from 60 days to a year in juvenile detention.

In June of 1999, Warren Glowatski was convicted of second-degree murder and later sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for seven years. Despite the efforts of her lawyers, Kelly Ellard was tried as an adult. And in March 2000, she received the same conviction and sentence as Glowatski, though she would be allowed to apply for parole after five years. However, it was overturned in 2003, and a second trial began in June 2004. A month later, the judge declared a mistrial due to a deadlocked jury. A third trial commenced in February 2005, and on April 12, Ellard was found guilty again. While serving time, she had two children and was granted conditional parole varying in length over the years. In 2017, she changed her name to Kerry Marie Sim.

Unlike Ellard, Warren Glowatski made changes in prison, participating in volunteer programs and seeking forgiveness through restorative justice. Suman and Manjit Virk, who became vocal anti-bullying advocates, forgave him after some efforts for reconciliation and approved of him being fully paroled in June 2010.

In the Media

Due to the unprecedented nature of the crime, the tragic murder made national headlines. A number of scholarly texts, books, and podcasts have covered the case. Creative works have also paid tribute to the story over the years including plays and a 2015 collection of poems by Canadian writer Soraya Peerbaye. In 2008, 10 years before the untimely death of his wife Suman, Manjit Virk released his own account of the devastation his family went through in “Reena: A Father’s Story.”

Before that and shortly after the crime occurred, New York-based author Rebecca Godfrey returned to her hometown of Victoria and began researching the case. Her book “Under the Bridge: The True Story of the Murder of Reena Virk” was released in 2005 and re-issued in the midst of the true crime boom in 2019. An eight-part limited series based on the book went into development with writer-director Quinn Shephard at the helm and Godfrey as an executive producer. Sadly, Godfrey passed away from lung cancer in October 2022 before production began.

“Under the Bridge” premiered on April 17, 2024, on Hulu with Riley Keough starring as the late author. The highly anticipated series also stars Oscar nominee Lily Gladstone as police officer Cam Bentland.

Will you be watching “Under the Bridge”? Let us know in the comments below.