Police are investigating a suspicious death after a 16-year-old boy was found dead on a Booth Street sidewalk Monday.
Police were called to the 300-block of Booth Street between Eccles and Poplar Streets at 10:27 a.m., where they found an unconscious male outside.
The identity of the person is being verified and the cause of death will be determined by autopsy, police said.
The young male had no vital signs upon the arrival of paramedics, according to spokesman J.P. Trottier.
Police have not confirmed whether the suspicious death is a homicide, but the investigation is the same for both, said Ottawa police Const. J.P. Vincelette.
A male witness who lives across the street from where the body was found said he didn’t hear anything unusual Monday morning, but opened his curtains to see flashing lights and paramedics gathered around a body on the ground.
Someone was screaming, the man said. “‘He was saying, ‘He’s dead, he’s dead.’ I didn’t get a look at who it was.
“They were all pretty hysterical about what had happened.”
There was blood on the man’s torso, the witness added, “and there was blood around the body.”
The witness said police covered a pool of blood on the sidewalk with a yellow tarp.
“Details about how the body got there are being investigated,” said Vincelette.
