Bodies inside home near Montreal may have been there for days or weeks: police

Quebec provincial police say a man and woman found dead inside a Vaudreuil-Dorion home may have been there for several days or weeks.

The Sûreté du Québec reported Monday that much remains unclear in the case after the pair’s bodies were discovered over the weekend by police officers in the city just west of Montreal.

Authorities were called to the residence on des Sauternes Street early Sunday afternoon for a wellness check, after someone close to the two people were concerned because they hadn’t heard from them in a while.

Autopsies will be performed to determine the cause of death, as well as the formal identities of the man and woman. Police say all hypotheses are being considered at the moment.

Vaudreuil-Dorion residents were shocked to learn of the deaths in their community.

Carole Haddad lives nearby, but said she rarely saw her neighbours in the seven years she has lived there. She described them as “very discreet.”

“They weren’t there most of the year,” she said. “We would see them two to three times a year, in and out.”

At first, another resident who lives on the same suburban street didn’t know what was going on when police cars and trucks showed up to the grey brick home Sunday afternoon. Dina Mahfouz said police had questions about her neighbours, including whether or not she had seen them often.

“We never saw a lot of cars or a lot of movement and I think that’s why nobody suspected anything or nobody worried, you know, to come and knock,” she said.

Both women say it wasn’t uncommon to see the driveway of the two-garage house still stacked with snow in wintertime.

“It was really quiet,” Mahfouz said.

Police say the scene has been released and the investigation is ongoing.

.— with files from Global’s Alessia Simona Maratta and The Canadian Press