Teenage murder suspects ‘sighted’ in Ontario, 2300km from hunt

Northern Ontario police receive unconfirmed sightings of the teen fugitives 2300 km away from the current search site.

Gillam Police search the surrounding York Landing area for Bryer Schmegelsky and Kam McLeod. Picture: Clint Brewer

Police in northern Ontario say they’ve received a number of calls reporting sightings of two teenage fugitives wanted over the murders of Australian Lucas Fowler and his American girlfriend Chynna Dees.

Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, and childhood friend Kam McLeod, 19, are at the centre of a nationwide manhunt over the double murder and separate killing of University of British Columbia lecturer Leonard Dyck.

The pair were last seen a week ago, around 2300km away in a remote community in northern Manitoba, where the current search is still on-going.

Northeastern Ontario Provincial Police Constable Michelle Cuolombe said police had received two possible sightings; one near the small town of Kapuskasing and another in the town of Iron Bridge. Neither of the sightings has been confirmed.

Constable Cuolombe said police had received a call reporting a suspicious white vehicle driving through a construction zone near Kapuskasing at 10.30am local time.

“There [were] two occupants in the vehicle who had similar descriptions to the suspects who are wanted in the BC murders,” she said.

“The only witness to that was the flag-person. All our frontline members and resources conducted a search of that area with negative results.”

She added: “We are not able to confirm at this time if that was them.”

It came as the manhunt for the teens was scaled back after nine days.

Canadian police announced overnight the military was pulling out of the search that has employed helicopters, drones, boats and dogs and stretched across three provinces in the country’s remote north.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police Inspector Kevin Lewis said the force has decided they no longer needed military assistance. At one point a military Hercules aircraft was used in the search.

“We want to again be focused with our own resources and determine where we should go from here,” Inspector Lewis said.

Canadian authorities admitted they had stopped and released the teens last week at the start of the manhunt.

Police had stopped the duo for a routine alcohol check as they drove through the dry Manitoba reserve of the Tataskweyak Cree Nation last week.

Nathan Neckoway, a Tataskweyak Cree Nation councillor, said the band constables — community police — who stopped the pair did not notice anything of concern and let them go.

“We weren’t aware of their status, of them being wanted,” Mr Neckoway told Global News in Canada. “Apparently after they came to our community that’s when they sent out that wanted (status).”

Tataskweyak Cree Nation is located in Split Lake, about 169km west of Gillam, where police have focused search ­efforts after the discovery of a burnt-out Toyota RAV4 the pair were driving and confirmed sightings.

First Nations safety officer Sylvia Saunders said the pair ­failed to stop at an alcohol checkpoint. Two band constables pursued them with lights on and pulled them over. “They apologised and said they needed to gas up,” Ms Saunders told Canada’s The Globe and Mail.

“(The constables) looked ­toward the (back seat) and they said they noticed camping gear and maps. They didn’t have to do a thorough search; they weren’t asked to step out or anything.”

The encounter was on July 22, a day before the teenagers were named as murder suspects.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police had said there was a confirmed sighting of the teenagers in Split Lake.

Police swarmed the remote Manitoba town of York Landing following a reported sighting of the pair scavenging for food from a dump.

Police yesterday said they were pulling back from York Landing but said some resources would remain, and residents were urged to be vigilant.

“After a thorough & exhaustive search, #rcmpmb has not been able to substantiate the tip in York Landing,” the RCMP said on Twitter.

Schmegelsky and McLeod were last week charged in their absence with Mr Dyck’s murder and were declared suspects in the murders of Mr Fowler and Ms Deese. Police say they are dangerous and should not be ­approached.

“Our No 1 priority is to find these individuals,” RCMP spokeswoman Julie Courchaine told reporters in an update.

The bodies of Mr Fowler, from Sydney, and Ms Deese, from Charlotte in North Caro­lina, were found in a ditch near their van on the Alaska Highway about 20km south of Liard Hot Springs on July 15.

Mr Dyck was found dead in a highway rest stop about 470km away on July 19.

Mr Fowler is the son of NSW police chief inspector Stephen Fowler, who flew to Canada from Sydney with his wife Shaunagh Fowler, other family members and homicide detectives.