A 14-year-old boy who was abducted in North York on Wednesday morning over his stepbrother’s alleged unpaid drug debt has been found safe, Toronto police say.
In a tweet on Thursday evening, police said the teen is being taken to a hospital for a medical checkup. They will hold a news conference on Friday morning to provide more details.
Speaking to reporters earlier in the evening,Toronto police Supt. Steve Watts said the teen's brother owes approximately $4 million worth of cocaine in relation to a drug "rip" that dates back to last summer.
Police said the boy was reported missing by his father at around 5:30 p.m. Wednesday shortly after learning that their son hadn’t made it to school that morning.
The teen was abducted several hours before his parents realized he was missing, Watts said, adding that police received an unknown trouble call that morning.
Witnesses in the area of Jane Street and Driftwood Avenue, north of Finch Avenue, told police that on Wednesday morning they observed a teenage male screaming "help me, help me" before being forced into a black Jeep Wrangler by two males, who drove away.
Investigators said the boy was standing outside 353 Driftwood Avenue shortly before 8:30 a.m. when he was forced into the Jeep.
An Amber Alert was issued for the missing teen shortly after midnight, nearly 16 hours after he was last seen.
Police have communicated with the suspects, Watts said, but he wouldn't speak further on the details. He said the stepbrother has been cooperating in the investigation.
The Toronto District School Board confirmed on Thursday that the boy's parents weren’t actually contacted about his absence from classes at Newtonbrook Secondary School until 6:10 p.m. on the day he disappeared.
The TDSB said that parents will typically receive automated calls about student absences at 11 a.m. and 6 p.m. but for some reason that did not happen in the teen's case.
TDSB spokesperson Ryan Bird said teachers are required to enter attendance information into an electronic system "promptly" after class has started.
"At this time what we do know is that the information wasn’t in our system at that 11 a.m. cut-off time and now we are looking into those finer details to exactly how that happened," Bird said.
The board said that four school staff members have been placed on home assignment while it looks into the matter further.
"Obviously should there be any culpable behaviour, then disciplinary action can be a result," Bird said.
"Not only do we want to know (what happened), we know that the parents deserve to know and we have tried to keep them up to date throughout the day... telling them what we know up until this point and obviously offering any support we can."
Police were looking for a vehicle of interest observed in the area where the victim was last seen, police said. It is described as a black Jeep Wrangler with oversized front tires and a front push bar with round fog lights.
Watts said they believe a burned out vehicle that was found in the area of Forks of the Credit Provincial Park in Caledon, Ont. is the same vehicle that was used in the boy's abduction.
Aerial footage from Chopper 24, which was captured on Thursday morning after the vehicle had been taken away, showed multiple police vehicles and officers in the area it was discovered.
Toronto police officers are working with the Ontario Provincial Police to investigate the burned vehicle.
