Selected quotes from Tuesday’s news conference detailing known facts about the hunt for murder suspect Jesse Norman Imeson.
Reported by Casey Lessard
Windsor Detective Staff Sargeant William Donnelly:
The search was called off 1 a.m. Sunday morning after the search had commenced Saturday afternoon. The decision to end that search was a joint decision made by both myself and the incident command of the OPP having satisfied ourselves that the area had been thoroughly searched, that area being the containment area that was designated as part of the original search. That designated area was based on credible information we had at the time and the only information we had at the time. That area was approximately four square miles. I am personally satisfied that the area was thoroughly searched and that Mr. Imeson was not in the containment area at the conclusion of that ground and air and canine search. For those reasons, the search was ended – it was not called off – it was not ended because there was nothing else we could do in that area, and we turned our attention to other information.
The search was continuing and has continued since that containment search was ended. The only thing that ended that day was the intensive ground search involving the ERT teams of the OPP, the use of the infra-red helicopter and the use of the canines because it was pointless to start randomly deploying canine units in areas that we had no credible information that he was sighted. The search continued by patrol officers in the area and it has never ended from the time we issued the zone alert from the Windsor police service.
What’s happening right now?
OPP Detective Inspector Dave Cardwell:
What we have deployed in the air is an OPP aircraft, an OPP helicopter, we have crews on the ground doing specific searches I have asked them to do. We have a number of officers investigating tips and leads as they come in. Ontario’s a big place. We obviously would like this person in custody or for him to turn himself into police. It’s one large area and to simply say it’s that easy to find someone is not so.
I don’t think I can say he’s not in this area. I don’t think we can truly say where he is. That is very problematic in trying to track him down and hence our request to perhaps utilize extra eyes in the community to look for the vehicle we are after.
At this time it’s a possibility the bodies could have been there approximately 20 hours in advance.
He’s unpredictable in my view.
I can’t say if he’s still in this area. I can’t say he’s not.