Saskatchewan RCMP say they’ve found man wanted in suspected homicide, abduction

CREIGHTON, Sask. – Police say they have found a suspect in the fatal shooting of a man and the abduction of a 17-year-old girl in northern Saskatchewan.

RCMP Sgt. Craig Cleary says that officers located Jonas Budd, after an extensive search, at a home in Sturgeon Landing close to the Manitoba boundary.

“(We) are committed to trying to resolve this as peacefully and as safely as possible,” Cleary said Thursday.

Officers established a perimeter around the house, which relatives described as being the homes of Jonas’s brother Glenn Budd.

The search for Jonas Budd began in Manitoba and Saskatchewan on Wednesday after a 17-year-old boy was killed and his girlfriend abducted.

An Amber Alert was issued for Kayla Natomagan of the Lac La Ronge First Nation, but was cancelled when she was found unharmed near Cranberry Portage in Manitoba, about 450 kilometres from her home.

RCMP said at the time that they believed Budd, 43, had fled on foot into the bush. They had said he was armed and dangerous.

Cleary said Sturgeon Landing residents were being asked to be mindful of police barricades.

“These kinds of situations can last a short period of time or a number of days unfortunately.”

On Wednesday, Glenn Budd said he hoped the matter would end peacefully without further bloodshed.

On Thursday, Joyce Budd said that her brother Jonas asked Glenn to deliver a letter to RCMP indicating he wanted to surrender peacefully, but that had not yet happened by late Thursday night.

“If there was any chance that my brother could hear us talking, I would tell him that I love him,” she said. “Our family is so stressed out right now. We just want my brother to come out of the house and we want him alive and well.

“We know he has to pay consequences. He knows that also. Why aren’t the police working with him to allow him to start?”

Crown prosecutor Luke Coupal said an arrest warrant had been issued for Jonas Budd, just hours before the shooting, on charges of break and enter and mischief dating back to an alleged incident in early October at the home of Natomagan’s mother.

He was scheduled to appear in court Wednesday but didn’t show up.

Tammy Cook-Searson, chief of the Lac La Ronge First Nation, has said Budd is the former boyfriend of Natomagan’s mother, who had a restraining order against him.

She said family and friends identified the dead teen as Dustin Bird, who had been dating Natomagan. Police, who have not publicly confirmed Bird’s identity, said they found one person dead at the scene of the abduction.

— By Clare Clancy in Regina, with files from CJLR and CJME