Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Cops to exhume teen's body


A teenage boy’s questionable suicide in 1992, two years before his older sister’s mangled remains were found in a burning suitcase, is now the subject of a Toronto Police cold case investigation.
Det.-Sgt. Steve Ryan revealed Monday the remains of Dwayne Biddersingh will be dug up more than two decades after the 15-year-old plunged to his death at a Parkdale highrise.
“We don’t want to miss anything,” said Ryan. “So in the name of thoroughness, we’ve arranged to have Dwayne’s body exhumed at the end of the month.”
Investigators have ruled the boy’s tumble from the balcony of his family’s 22nd-floor apartment on Close Ave. a suicide, but Ryan wants to take a fresh look at the teen’s death in light of how his older sister met her demise.
Melonie Biddersingh, 17, vanished in 1994 but was never reported missing by her family.
A teenage girl’s charred remains were found that same year stuffed in a suitcase after a fire was doused behind an industrial building in Vaughan.
The victim, who remained unidentified for 18 years, was malnourished and had extensive injuries that a forensic pathologist later speculated may have been suffered in a fall from a great height.
It’s believed the fractures to her back, ribs, pelvis, knee and ankle would have left her immobile and in tremendous pain in the weeks or months prior to her death.
In February 2012, police received a tip that allowed them to finally crack the cold case and identify the girl’s remains.
Melonie’s father and step-mother were arrested the following month in Welland, Ont.
Everton Biddersingh, 56, who remains in custody, and his wife, Elaine, 50, who was released on bail in November, each face a charge of first-degree murder.
News of Melonie’s death intensified lingering doubts her biological mother, Opal Austin, and a close family friend, Elias Azan — who both lived in Jamaica — had about the so-called suicide of her younger brother Dwayne.
“I never believed he killed himself and I told police in Toronto at the time they need to dig deeper,” Azan told the Toronto Sun at the time.
The former Jamaican cop, who helped raise Dwayne and Melonie, admitted feeling responsible for their deaths because he encouraged Austin to send her kids to live with their dad in Canada for a chance at a better life.
Dwayne’s body, which is buried in Toronto, will be removed from its grave Jan. 22 and examined by a forensic pathologist.
Ryan said it was a difficult but necessary decision.
“It’s a tough thing to do, to disturb a little boy,” the veteran detective said. “But just so we’re sure we haven’t missed anything, we’re going to have him exhumed.”
Ryan said there is no evidence to suggest Dwayne’s death was anything other than a suicide at this point.
“But we want to make sure there was no other reason he went over that balcony,” he said. “And if there was foul play, then we want to know who did it.”