A three-year-old girl from Montreal who had been missing since Sunday was found alive in Ontario Wednesday afternoon, putting an end to four days of searching across hundreds of kilometres over two provinces.
Police said the child was “doing well” — without going into further details about her health — after she was found all alone along Highway 417, east of the on-ramp for Casselman, Ont., in the early afternoon.
“She was conscious. She was talking,” said Sgt. Éloïse Cossette with the Sûreté du Québec.
“It’s a relief. It’s the most positive scenario we could have hoped for.”
Ontario Provincial Police found the girl while searching the rural area southeast of Ottawa with a drone.
“It’s one of the reasons we become police officers is to have days like this,” said Acting Staff Sgt. Shaun Cameron, a media relations officer with the OPP. “A lot of the days, there aren’t great outcomes. And we are parents, us too, right. So to be able to find a youth that’s been missing numerous days in this situation definitely would bring out emotions in almost all officers.”
The SQ said some of the girl’s family members were on the way to visit her.
“She has been found!!! Thank you to everyone,” the girl’s father wrote on social media. “Please allow me and my family to take this time with our girl.”
The child was reported missing by her mother on Sunday afternoon, about six hours after they left their Montreal home and some 90 minutes after they were last seen together near Casselman.
The 34-year-old mother was later charged with unlawful abandonment of a child. She appeared in court Wednesday, where she had her bail hearing postponed to Friday.
Cossette said tips from the public and witnesses were instrumental in helping find the child. Quebec Premier François Legault echoed that sentiment in a social media post.
“I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to all the police officers, from the @sureteduquebec and their partners, who worked tirelessly to find her, as well as to their colleagues at the Ontario Provincial Police,” Quebec Premier François Legault wrote on X. “I also want to acknowledge the contribution of all those who provided information to the police, enabling them to find the little girl alive.”
The search took major step forward earlier Wednesday, with investigators able to establish the girl and her mother were spotted together in the Casselman and St. Albert area on Sunday around 2 p.m.
That narrowed the timeframe considerably, since investigators were previously working off the information that the child was last seen alive at her home in LaSalle, in Montreal, at 9:45 a.m. that day.
It also narrowed the possible location of the mother’s vehicle, which would have been on the road — likely on highways 417, 40, 30 and 20 — between 2 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. to get from the Ontario towns to Coteau-du-Lac, Que., where the mother showed up without her daughter and reported her missing.
Bail hearing postponed
The Montreal woman appeared at the courthouse in Salaberry-de-Valleyfield on Wednesday afternoon, not long before her child was found by police in Ontario.
Her court-appointed defence lawyer, Olivier Béliveau, asked for her bail hearing to be postponed until Friday — a request the judge granted.
There has been no application made for a psychiatric evaluation in relation to the accused’s mental health or her ability to stand a possible trial — from the judge, Crown or defence.
“There has been no reason to raise this issue at this time,” Crown prosecutor Lili Prévost-Gravel said.
Prévost-Gravel is objecting to the accused being granted bail due to the seriousness of the alleged crime, risks to public safety and the potential of hurting the investigation.
