The remains found outside a Riverdale butcher shop on Tuesday belonged to a woman, a spokesperson for the coroner's office has confirmed.
The grisly discovery was made by an employee of the butcher shop, located near Broadview Avenue and Gerrard Street, at around 11:30 a.m.
Police say a garbage bag containing what appeared to be torso belonging to a woman was found at the back of the building as the employee was taking out the garbage.
The remains were determined to be human following an autopsy conducted on Wednesday afternoon.
Police say that the coroner has been unable to determine anything else about the body at this point “as much further testing is still required.”
Speaking with reporters earlier in the day, Det.-Sgt. Terry Browne said it is possible that additional body parts could be found in the general vicinity of the butcher shop.
“Given that this item was located here I wouldn’t be surprised if there weren’t more parts somewhere elsewhere in the area,” he said. “If you come across something we don’t want you to touch it. Give us a call right away and we will come and examine it.”
Browne told reporters that the torso did not show significant signs of decomposition and was likely at the scene no more than a few hours prior to being located.
As for a cause of death, the detective said it is far too early to speculate.
“The circumstances surrounding the death of this person are completely up in the air right now. There could be a number of reasons of how this person died. Right now we have what appears to be an indignity to a body and we will work our way backwards and try to find out why that person may have met their demise,” he said. “The key right now is trying to identify who this person is.”
As part of the police investigation, Browne said that officers are speaking to witnesses and reviewing missing person reports from the area as well as surveillance camera footage.
One possible witness who spoke to police on Wednesday morning told CP24 that he saw a suspicious van parked outside the butcher shop at around 3 a.m. Tuesday.
He said a man got out of the vehicle, came back a short time later and drove away down Broadview.
"I just thought it was a paper delivery guy," the man said, adding that he came forward to police after learning what had been discovered at the back of the building.
Police have previously said that they believe the torso belonged to a light-skinned adult woman.
Browne said it is his hope that a pathologist will be able to provide more information, including the approximate age of the person they belonged to.
