8 bodies found in vehicles in farmland

Canadian police yesterday were investigating the murders of eight men whose bodies were left in a remote wooded area on a farmer's property marking the worse case of mass murder in Ontario's history.

Police were not disclosing many details about the deaths at the farm in the eastern Canadian province of Ontario, about 30 kilometres southwest of the city of London, except to say that four vehicles were involved, including a tow truck, and that the dead were all men. The bodies were found on Saturday morning.

"We are confident that all the victims were known to each other and were from the greater Toronto area," Ontario Provincial Police Detective Superintendent Ross Bingley said.

The bodies have been removed from the crime scene and await autopsies. Bingley said the victims have not been identified and no cause of death is available.

Police would not release any details about the victims until next of kin could be notified. They found the bodies after a call from the property owner, who is not considered a suspect.

An aerial view showed the vehicles parked within 200 metres of each other, with the bodies still inside.

The Ontario coroner and the attorney general's office declined comment.

A minivan was discovered in a field about 20 metres off a dirt road. About 100 metres away, a tow truck was found parked on the shoulder with a small silver-coloured car hooked to the back. A fourth car was parked in a clearing about 100 metres along the dirt road. The hatch was wide open.

Mary and Russell Steele, who own the property around which the cars were parked, told Global News that the vehicles were not there when they took the road home the night before at around 8:30 pm.

They said they called police on Saturday morning after looking inside one of the vehicles and not being able to see anything because of a blanket covering the back window.

"We didn't see anybody in them, so we just phoned the cops with the license plate numbers," Russell Steele said.

"The police opened the back and I could see forms," his wife said. "I couldn't tell, but immediately in my mind I thought, 'these are bodies."'

London is about 160 kilometres southwest of Toronto and about 50 kilometres north of Lake Erie.

Source:China Daily