RCMP, city police ask for public’s help in thawing cold homicide cases

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This article was published 08/03/2024 (624 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The 911 call came in at about 7 in the morning.

A passerby in the remote Northlands Denesuline First Nation community saw the flames consuming the small house and phoned the Mounties.

Safety officers on the reserve watched over the burning home as RCMP officers in Thompson travelled 240 kilometres northwest to the community, also known as Lac Brochet, that Sept. 9, 2021 morning.

The Mounties learned one, or maybe two people, were missing and might have been inside when the fire began. Friends Brent Denechezhe, 31, and Leona Tssessaze, 24, had been hanging out the night before; it was Denechezhe’s mother’s house.

When forensics investigators were able to get inside after the flames were out, they discovered the two friends’ bodies and had their remains sent to Winnipeg for autopsy.

RCMP major crimes investigators determined the two deaths were homicides, but the case remains unsolved.

Investigators travelled north again this week to conduct more interviews, hang more posters asking for tips and search for more clues tying someone to the community-shattering brutality.

Police will not reveal whether Denechezhe and Tssessaze died in the fire or if they had been slain beforehand.

But someone in the First Nation knows who had a hand in their deaths, Manitoba RCMP spokeswoman Tara Seel said Friday.

“This is a remote location. As the mother of Brent pointed out to me, the person or people responsible would have still been in the community shortly after it happened,” said Seel.

Whoever did it might still be in the fly-in community 1,100 kilometres north of Winnipeg.

“That has really shook a lot of people… to know that they could be interacting, or spending time with, or greeting someone who did this to these two young people,” said Seel.

RCMP investigators have set up a tip line (431-489-8112) for anyone with information that could help the probe.

Seel personally sat down to speak with the victims’ mothers.

“It was so hard to look at these women and see their pain, see what they’ve lost. One thing that (Tssessaze’s mother) Ellen said to me was, ‘I miss laying beside her on the bed and just talking,’” the Mounties’ spokeswoman said.

“As a parent of a daughter myself, that really hit home — just having those quiet moments where you’re together, and she misses that, and she’s still got to be a mom to her other children and put one foot in front of the other.”

Cold-case homicides become increasingly difficult to solve as time passes.

“Witnesses — their memory could deteriorate over time, and worst-case scenario is those witnesses could be deceased, depending on the length of time, so we might not even be able to get that valuable information,” said Seel.

“Evidence can deteriorate… if we’re looking for a murder weapon, if we’re looking for any DNA samples, that kind of thing deteriorates over time.”

Police appealed to the public this week in other unsolved cases.

Exactly one year ago, someone inside the dingy Manwin Hotel on Main Street found Treymaine Traverse lying dead in a suite.

Traverse, a 33-year-old member of O-Pipon-Na-Piwin Cree Nation, also known as South Indian Lake, was living in Winnipeg at the time.

The Free Press has learned that Traverse was not a tenant of the dilapidated, single-room-occupancy hotel where the doors rarely lock properly and the stink of mould permeates the air.

Winnipeg Police Service homicide detectives have revealed few details of what may have led him to the hotel where he was found in suspicious circumstances at about 10:45 on the morning of March 9. They haven’t said what the cause of death was, or how many suspects might have been involved.

But they renewed their call for information on the killing Friday, asking anyone with information, including people Traverse had contact with or know of his whereabouts before his death, to call them at 204-986-6508, or Crime Stoppers anonymously at 204-786-8477.

WPS spokeswoman Const. Dani McKinnon was not able to provide more information on the case Friday.

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca