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On January 20th, 2008 police were called to north Edmonton after the discovery of a frozen body was reported to 911. Police indicated that 43-year-old Maurice Powder was homeless and his death didn't appear to be suspicious in nature. Ironically, Powder's older brother David also died under similar circumstances nearly five years earlier – see below.

That a "homeless" person died so far from the downtown core became the focus of media and those working with the city's transient population. 44 persons without permanent residence died on city streets in 2007, a number that was expected to continue to rise.

At about 11:00 a.m. on the 20th, police received a call that a frozen body had been found in the middle-class Rosslyn neighbourhood north of the City Centre airport.

The body was spotted by a passerby, lying on his side in the backyard of a home near 113 A Street and 135 Avenue. A walker could be seen tipped over in the snow beside him.

"It appears we have a homeless individual who's succumbed to the weather. Until we can confirm an identity through the medical examiner, unfortunately that's all we can tell you," Sgt. Glenn Aston told media.

Ashton said that while police were looking into the death it didn't appear to be suspicious in nature.

Overnight temperatures dipped to -17 C, -26 C when windchill was taken into consideration.

The passerby had knocked on the door of Don Firmaniuk, who lived next door to the home where the body was found. Firmaniuk told media he checked on the body after he was told of the find.

"I reached down and I just sort of grabbed him by the shoulder above the arm and he's very rigid. So at that point – and just looking at his colour and everything – I kind of realised that he had passed on," Firmaniuk said.

The man said he went to bed around midnight early on the 20th and didn't hear anything unusual. He had never seen the man before.

"It is a tragic thing, you know. And I don't know what happened to the man so that even makes it worse," Firmaniuk said.

Residents of the property where the man was found weren't home when he persished.

Staff from the medical examiner's office removed the man's body later in the afternoon. It was believed the death was the first from exposure in 2008.

Results of an autopsy to determine the man's death were expected later in the week.

44 people died on city streets in 2007, a milestone marked by a memorial held at the downtown Hope Mission just one day before the man was found.

Sandra Ericson, head of Hope Mission's homelessness outreach program, told the Sun that she expected 2008 would see a record number of deaths.

"In 2006, it was 41. We expect the number to keep rising in 2008," said Ericson. 32 died in 2005.

The fact the man was found outside the central area wasn't that unusual, she added.

“It's a transient group. There's pressure from the community (and) there's police pressure to just keep moving them on. On a given winter night, there could be at least 1,800 people sleeping outdoors."

Over at the Bissell Centre, Ele Gibson said that homeless who prefer to stay away from the city's core have a harder time accessing the services available to them. She added that she's surprised there aren't more deaths from exposure during Edmonton's cold winters.

“It shows the survival ability and the resilience of these people,” she said.

During a recent count, 2,600 homeless people were numbered in the city.

"It's really hard to take care of yourself properly. Many of these people do not make it past the age of 45," said Lorette Garrick, executive director at the George Spady Centre, an overnight homeless shelter.

"It's a very hard life."

On January 21st, 2008 the Edmonton Sun interviewed 63-year-old Hilda Powder, Maurice's mother.

Maurice's death echoed that of his older brother, David, who also died in the cold in March 2003 outside the downtown Bissell Centre. Hilda refuted police reports that Maurice was homeless, saying the brain-injured man was simply confused.

“Maurice was not homeless. He had a home. He was living with us,” she told the Sun.

Family had reported Maurice missing on January 17th, three days before his body was found. The man had wandered away from the family home on 82nd Street earlier in the week.

A loner who spent his days at home playing cards or occasionally picking bottles on city streets, Maurice went for a walk on the 14th saying he needed some fresh air. He didn't come back.

While the Powders had been at their new home since October 2007, Maurice remained convinced he lived at the house near 113th A Street and 135th Avenue where they had lived for four years.

“I try and try to make him understand we don't live there anymore,” said Hilda. Maurice had often gone missing for days, each time ending up in his old neighbourhood.

According to Maurice's nephew, also named David Powder, the man suffered a brain injury suffered during a beating in Edmonton in 1989.

After leaving the Buffalo Lake Metis settlement near Lac La Biche, Maurice first came to Edmonton in 1970 and later owned a pizza shop in Medicine Hat.

David said his uncle's health had worsened in recent years.

“He was able to do everything but he forgets certain things. As he was getting older, it seemed he was getting more forgetful,” he said.

While relatives went to the old house to see if Maurice was there, police promised they would look for him. David wondered if they did enough to find his uncle, noting Maurice's disappearance didn't garner media attention as was the case for Wyona Hobart, a senior who went missing December 28th, 2007 after visiting her doctor.

Edmonton police deal with 8,000 missing persons cases a year. Staff Sgt. Bill Spinks, the officer who oversees the missing-persons unit, said police have to base their response according to risk.

“Unfortunately, we can't always find everybody as fast as we'd like to,” Spinks told the Sun.

For now, what worries the Powders most is how to pay for a burial for Maurice in Buffalo Lake. Hilda said she was presently on disability support and the family had just finished paying off cost from the older David's funeral in 2003.

40-year-old David Powder was found dead in March of that year during a week that saw three others die on Edmonton streets.

Maurice and David were found huddled together outside the Bissell Centre. Maurice survived a resulting bout of hypothermia while David died later in hospital. Coincidentally, David also had a brain injury – the result of a car accident in 1995.

During that cold spring, a man's decomposing body was found along with a sleeping bag, pillows and blankets under a concrete stairway below MacDonald Drive, another man was discovered in the alley behind the George Spady Centre, and a man in his 60s also was found dead in a ditch off Yellowhead Trail and 184th Street.

Police ruled all the deaths as non-criminal.

In 2002, a count revealed Edmonton's homeless population to be 1,915, up 65 per cent over the previous year.

deadmonton 2008 - other police matters - maurice powder