WINNIPEG — RCMP have identified a toddler whose remains were found in a barn in Manitoba this past summer.
Mounties said Xavia Skye Lynn Butler would have been between one and two years old at the time of her death but did not say when the girl died.
Her remains were located in a barn on a property near Grahamdale, about 200 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg, on June 3.
Her death is being investigated as a homicide.
RCMP said the last time investigators have been able to physically place Xavia was approximately a year before her remains were found, and there were no missing person reports filed about her in that time.
Sgt. Paul Manaigre said the girl was from Pinaymootang First Nation but had lived on the property at one point in her life. Police are still trying to determine if she was living there at the time of her death.
"She would have been with different family members at different times of her life. That's what we're trying to ascertain through a timeline," Manaigre said Friday.
"There's a long period of time that we're not aware of ... we want to narrow down the time frame as to when she was with family, when she wasn't."
Manaigre said Xavia was not in the care of child and family services.
Natalie Anderson, a relative of the girl, said she took care of the child for a period after she was born.
Anderson said she last saw Xavia in March 2022 when the girl went to live with other family members.
Anderson learned the girl had died after police found her remains, she said.
"Xavia was perfect. She was happy. She was loved. She was my chunky monkey," Anderson said.
"I want her story known."
Premier Wab Kinew called the case "absolutely tragic."
"When we think of such a young life being lost and that the circumstances are being investigated as a homicide, this is one of the worst things that can happen, bar none," Kinew said Friday.
"As a provincial government, when something like this happens in Manitoba, it makes you stop and take stock of what is happening across this land and resolve that ... we will have an attention towards preventing incidents like this from happening again."
Early details of the case bear some similarities to the death of Phoenix Sinclair in 2005. The five-year-old girl was not reported missing and, nine months after she was killed, her body was found near a landfill at the Fisher River Cree Nation north of Winnipeg.
Her mother, Samantha Kematch, and Kematch's common-law husband, Karl McKay, were later convicted of first-degree murder, and the death led to a public inquiry.
Mounties are looking for any photos of Xavia taken after March 2022 and are asking anyone who saw the girl after that date to contact them.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 1, 2024.
Steve Lambert and Brittany Hobson, The Canadian Press
