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Two people arrested in Saskatoon’s first homicide of 2024 now face additional charges.

Previously charged with first-degree murder, 34-year-old Edin Dion Vrazalica and 32-year-old Chantal McLaren have now also been charged with indecently interfering with and offering an indignity to human remains, police said Thursday in a news release.

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Investigators arrested the two from correctional facilities in Saskatoon and Prince Albert this week, where they were already incarcerated on the murder charges.

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The 25-year-old victim was found during a search of a home on Lisgar Avenue on Feb. 3. His identity was confirmed after an autopsy, but has been withheld at the family’s request.

During the search, Vrazalica was shot by police and taken to hospital in stable condition. The provincial Serious Incident Response Team is continues to investigate the police-involved shooting.

OTHER HOMICIDE INVESTIGATIONS CONTINUE

On Feb. 9, a 48-year-old Saskatoon man died of a gunshot wound in the city’s second homicide of the year. A 21-year-old Saskatoon man has been charged in that case.

The city’s third homicide involved a 48-year-old man who died in hospital from a gunshot wound on Feb. 17. The incident is still under investigation.

The fourth homicide of 2024 took place on Feb. 19. According to police, officers responded around 2 p.m. to a report of a man stabbed in the 200 block of 20th Street West. After an investigation involving SPS major crime, serious assault and forensic identification units, a 24-year-old man was charged with second-degree murder.

In the city’s fifth homicide, a 12-year old boy was shot on Feb. 19. The two people charged with manslaughter are a 12-year-old boy and a 13-year-old boy. The two boys cannot be identified under provisions of the Youth Criminal Justice Act. Both boys are also being charged with four weapons-related offences.

The city recorded 12 homicides in 2023, with charges laid in all but two of those. In 2022, Saskatoon saw the number of homicides recorded in the city jump to 13 from seven in 2021.

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