Nothing criminal about Tammy Keeash's 'tragic' death, say police in Thunder Bay, Ont.

A 17-year-old girl from North Caribou Lake First Nation, whose body was found inThunder Bay's Neebing-McIntyre Floodway died by drowning, according to city police, after the completion of a post mortem.

There is"no evidence to indicate criminality" in the "tragic" death ofTammy Keeash, Thunder Bay police said in a news release issued on Friday.

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The teen's body was found on Sunday, May 7 in the water near Chapples Park just before 9 p.m., police said.

The conclusion runs contrary to a newsrelease issued on Wednesday byNishnawbeAskiNation that referred toKeeash'sdeath as a potential homicide.

"We have strongly encouraged police not to rule out any possible causes for her death until a thorough investigation is completed," Deputy Grand Chief Anna BettyAchneepineskumsaid in a statement on Thursday.

No one from Nishnawbe Aski Nation was immediately available to comment on Friday's news release from the police.

"It's never been deemed a homicide so I don't know where they received that information from, it wasn't from the police," Det. Sgt. Ryan Hughes told CBC News."We were investigating it as a death and whatever avenue it took us on, through the investigative process, was the avenue we would take."

The way that Thunder Bay police investigate deaths of Indigenous people is also the subject of anon-going systemic reviewby Ontario's police watchdog after the death ofStacyDebungee, who was also found in a river.

Keeash is the sixth First Nations teen to be found dead in a river in Thunder Bay since 2000. Questions were raised about the quality of Thunder Bay police investigations and the 'no foul play' determination during an inquest into the other five drownings.

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Another concern raised by the inquest was about public notice regarding missing persons reports to police.

Police were contacted byKeeash'sguardian on Sunday afternoon requesting that officers check on her at a specified address; when police were not able to contact her, she was officially reported missing about an hour later, according to police.

Hughes saidthere was no media notification of Keeash's disappearance because of the short time between when she was reported missing and when she was found dead.

"She was reported missing at 2:30 and she was discovered at around 9 p.m. that night," Hughes said. "So for a media release...it varies on different situations, during that time there wasn't one that was issued."

A subsequent investigation, that police referred to as "extensive," determined that Keeash was last seen on Saturday, May 6 around 10:30 p.m. near the floodway's shore. She was in the care of Tikinagan Child and Family Services when she died.

Keeash is the fourth teen from a remote First Nation in northern Ontario to die while in the custody of a child welfare agency since October, 2016. Her death continues to be investigated by the coroner.

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