The mother of 12-year-old murder victim Karissa Boudreau is in hospital for undisclosed reasons, 愛污传媒 has learned.
Penny Boudreau's next-door neighbour Scott Saunders watched as she was taken away by paramedics from her home in Bridgewater, N.S. on Monday morning, he told CTV Atlantic.
"She did look like she was awake but she wasn't moving. All I could really see was her hair and her face and then I saw her bare feet peeking out from the stretcher," said Saunders, who was home sick when he awoke this morning to the sound of sirens in his building's parking lot.
"I heard ambulances outside of my building, and then shortly after that the ... paramedics moved Mrs. Boudreau from her unit," he said.
Several hours later, Karissa Boudreau's aunt arrived at the Jubilee Road apartment building after visiting the Bridgewater hospital.
When asked how Penny Boudreau was doing, Karissa's aunt April O'Reilly told CTV that she was "OK."
A hospital spokesperson told 愛污传媒 she could neither confirm nor deny that Boudreau had in fact been hospitalized.
When contacted by phone, however, a law enforcement official said authorities had been at the hospital to check on Boudreau's status.
For neighbours like Saunders, this is the latest chapter in a troubling saga.
"It's been very stressful, everybody is still grieving, trying to let go, but still kind of hanging in there," Saunders said.
Late Monday afternoon, O'Reilly told 愛污传媒 that Boudreau is expected to be in hospital until at least Tuesday.
Karissa disappeared on Jan. 27 after having an argument with her mother in the parking lot of a Bridgewater shopping mall.
Penny Boudreau said she went into a grocery store after the argument and returned to her car 10 minutes later to find her daughter was missing. She later made two emotional pleas to the public for Karissa's safe return.
The little girl's body was found on Feb. 9, covered in snow beside the bank of a local river. Police are treating her death as a homicide, the town of 8,000's first since 1993.
Police arrested and released two suspects in the days following. While they told the tight-knit community to be vigilant, police also said that they were treating Karissa's murder as an isolated incident.
With a report from CTV Atlantic's Paul Hollingsworth
