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Malcom is Missing: A Daughter's Journey to Uncover Corruption and Truth in Mexico
A single mother of two from small-town Canada looks for her missing father in Mexico and ends up taking on one of the most corrupt justice systems in the world.
In October 2018, Brooke Mullins hastily packed a small bag and boarded a flight to Mexico. But it wasn’t for leisure. Five days prior, she received harrowing her father, Canadian artist Malcom Madsen, had vanished. Driven by an instinct that all was not well, Brooke embarked on a quest to find him.
Within days, her worst fears were it seemed Malcom had met a tragic end. Armed with a damning video capturing his drugging, GPS data tracing his car to a remote jungle spot on the night of his disappearance, and a series of relatively misleading statements from his Mexican girlfriend, Brooke turned to Mexican authorities, hoping for closure.
Yet, even after numerous gruelling years and over $300,000 spent, closure eludes her grasp. Despite the emotional and legal hurdles, Brooke persists, propelled by twin to recover her father’s remains and to ensure justice for his perpetrators. Many might deem challenging Mexico’s notoriously corrupt legal system a fool’s errand, especially for a 42-year-old single mother from Port Hope, Ontario. But Brooke Mullins dismissed such doubts, steadfast in her resolve to fight on.
In October 2018, Brooke Mullins hastily packed a small bag and boarded a flight to Mexico. But it wasn’t for leisure. Five days prior, she received harrowing her father, Canadian artist Malcom Madsen, had vanished. Driven by an instinct that all was not well, Brooke embarked on a quest to find him.
Within days, her worst fears were it seemed Malcom had met a tragic end. Armed with a damning video capturing his drugging, GPS data tracing his car to a remote jungle spot on the night of his disappearance, and a series of relatively misleading statements from his Mexican girlfriend, Brooke turned to Mexican authorities, hoping for closure.
Yet, even after numerous gruelling years and over $300,000 spent, closure eludes her grasp. Despite the emotional and legal hurdles, Brooke persists, propelled by twin to recover her father’s remains and to ensure justice for his perpetrators. Many might deem challenging Mexico’s notoriously corrupt legal system a fool’s errand, especially for a 42-year-old single mother from Port Hope, Ontario. But Brooke Mullins dismissed such doubts, steadfast in her resolve to fight on.
- GenresTrue Crime
250 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 22, 2025
6 people are currently reading
62 people want to read
About the author
Robert Osborne
3 booksRobert Osborne is a best selling author in Canada, an award-winning documentary filmmaker and investigative journalist. He’s spent more than twenty-five years working for network television shows and developed a parallel career as a feature writer, providing articles for the Toronto Star, Globe and Mail and the National Post.
In 2012 he moved into the documentary field, first working as a script editor for The Beaver Whisperers on CBC’s The Nature of Things. During the past ten years, he researched, directed, wrote and produced the documentaries Unstoppable: The Fentanyl Epidemic; The Third Dive: The Death of Rob Stewart and Malcom is Missing.
Robert has won multiple RTNDA awards and a CAJ award for Investigative Journalism. In 2009 he received a Citation of Merit from the Governor General’s Michener Awards for a documentary on police accountability. In 2018 he won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Writing in a Documentary for Unstoppable.
Robert has also published a non-fiction mystery book called The Third Dive, based on the documentary by the same title and he has also just published his second book, Malcom is Missing.
In 2012 he moved into the documentary field, first working as a script editor for The Beaver Whisperers on CBC’s The Nature of Things. During the past ten years, he researched, directed, wrote and produced the documentaries Unstoppable: The Fentanyl Epidemic; The Third Dive: The Death of Rob Stewart and Malcom is Missing.
Robert has won multiple RTNDA awards and a CAJ award for Investigative Journalism. In 2009 he received a Citation of Merit from the Governor General’s Michener Awards for a documentary on police accountability. In 2018 he won the Canadian Screen Award for Best Writing in a Documentary for Unstoppable.
Robert has also published a non-fiction mystery book called The Third Dive, based on the documentary by the same title and he has also just published his second book, Malcom is Missing.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 28, 2025
I originally read about this case in The Toronto Star, and was eager to read the book to get more details and discover the outcome of the investigation. Malcolm Madsen was a retired Canadian who spent part of the year in Mexico. He had a girlfriend, Marcela who lived in his home there (which he put in her name). One night, they went out to dinner and after he left the bar, he was never seen again. Marcela claimed that they came home and Malcolm later left for his other 'treehouse' home. But Malcolm's Canadian daughter Brooke was not satisfied with this explanation and strongly suspected Marcela of murder. Although Malcolm's body was never found, Mexico has a long history of people who go missing, so 'disappearing' a person is an actual charge. Brooke followed her intuition and pursued a logical explanation of Malcolm's disappearance. She was up against the corrupt Mexican legal system, and had to fight for every bit of progress in the case. She also had to hunt down most of the evidence, including video from the bar that shows Marcela tampering with Malcolm's drink. It was a long fight, on many fronts, but Brooke did manage to get justice for her father.
The story as Osborne tells it is not just about the relationship between Malcolm and Marcela and about Brooke's determination. The best part of the book (in my opinion) is the insight that he offers into how the legal system works in Mexico. The amount of corruption is mind-boggling, to the point where Brooke had to pay the police to make an arrest, even though they had ample evidence. That is just one stunning detail from a complex case.
I also found the contrast between privileged Canadian Brooke and poverty stricken desperate Marcela to be riveting. Brooke had her firm assumptions about Marcela as a gold digger and a user, but the flip side is that Marcela was a desperate woman with few options, and one of many women in Mexico who trade their looks for the company and protection of wealthy older retired men. That doesn't excuse what Marcela did, but it does give the readers a perspective on how a human soul can be morphed into a monster. I recommend this book as a fascinating glimpse of a crime, of Mexican corruption and of the the very long distance between Canadian lives and the ones lived by the Mexicans.
The story as Osborne tells it is not just about the relationship between Malcolm and Marcela and about Brooke's determination. The best part of the book (in my opinion) is the insight that he offers into how the legal system works in Mexico. The amount of corruption is mind-boggling, to the point where Brooke had to pay the police to make an arrest, even though they had ample evidence. That is just one stunning detail from a complex case.
I also found the contrast between privileged Canadian Brooke and poverty stricken desperate Marcela to be riveting. Brooke had her firm assumptions about Marcela as a gold digger and a user, but the flip side is that Marcela was a desperate woman with few options, and one of many women in Mexico who trade their looks for the company and protection of wealthy older retired men. That doesn't excuse what Marcela did, but it does give the readers a perspective on how a human soul can be morphed into a monster. I recommend this book as a fascinating glimpse of a crime, of Mexican corruption and of the the very long distance between Canadian lives and the ones lived by the Mexicans.
June 20, 2025
Exceptional work.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews