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Mother grief-stricken after son's frozen body found

Peguis search team finds teen's remains in snow

By: Alexandra Paul

Posted: 02/6/2012 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies) | Last Modified: 02/6/2012 10:28 AM | Updates

FACEBOOK Andrew Stevenson was 17.

The mother of a missing teen whose body was found this weekend was in Peguis First Nation Sunday, searching for answers to the disappearance and death of Andrew Stevenson.

Local searchers found the 17-year-old's remains south of Peguis in a rural area around Hodgson about 3:30 p.m. Saturday, a week after he'd gone missing.

"I'm having a hard time," said his mother Rachelle Beauchamp in a brief call from the First Nation, located 220 kilometres north of Winnipeg in Manitoba's Interlake.

Overwhelmed with grief, Beauchamp broke down on the phone. She gave permission for her son's photo on Facebook to be printed.

A relative of the boy's father said the community is as much in the dark as everyone else.

"Nobody will know what happened until the police finish their investigation," the relative said.

RCMP say they are still looking for answers, too. They've issued a public notice asking anyone with information about Stevenson's whereabouts before he died to contact the Fisher Branch detachment.

Beauchamp said her son lived in Winnipeg and had gone to Peguis to visit relatives more than a week ago. He'd been staying with relatives in Peguis and was last seen on the morning of Jan. 30.

"We don't know what happened," his mother said.

RCMP said for now they suspect no foul play. They are waiting for the results of an autopsy.

Beauchamp said it was her brother who identified her son's body when searchers found the remains Saturday.

Peguis fire Chief Dean Cochrane said he organized a ground search this weekend, with local fire fighters from the First Nation.

They didn't find anything until late afternoon when one search party of three found the teenager's body in the snow.

The remains had been out in the elements long enough to be frozen.

Cochrane said the discovery wasn't the way firefighters had expected the search to end.

"We were just hoping he was at someone's house in the city. It was unfortunate," the fire chief said.

In the week leading up to the discovery, family had posted notices about the missing teen at Interlake gas stations.

Meanwhile, at Peguis, the absence of information is fueling all kinds of rumours about how the teen ended up dead outside in the middle of winter.

The talk isn't helping the grieving family, the fire chief said.

"All the rumours that are flying around, I'd encourage people not to pass on any information they don't know first hand," Cochrane said. He said he wasn't going to repeat the gossip but he said it's bad enough that he had to speak out against it.

The mother of one of the teen's friends in Winnipeg said on the Free Press website that reports of Stevenson's death were a shock.

"This beautiful smiling boy was the friend of my daughter. He was always so polite and respectful when he was in our home. She and the family are devastated. We don't know what happened. We thought all was well. He was too young to go. God Bless you Andrew. We love you."

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition February 6, 2012 B5

History

Updated on Monday, February 6, 2012 at 10:28 AM CST: Removes erroneous Facebook reference.

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