In early September of 2001, the body of a short, well-dressed, blue-eyed man with good teeth and a silver ring on his little finger was found on a bench beside a hiking trail about 90 minutes' drive north of Ottawa. There was, in the words of investigating police officers, no evidence of 'trauma to the body'.
That means it wasn't evident he was the victim of a crime. His body had been on the bench for a couple of days.
Temperatures can fall below freezing at night in early September so, although details of his autopsy report have not been made public, it is likely that he succumbed to the cold. What's so intriguing about his case is the contents of his nylon knapsack. It contained a torch, a bottle of water, two protein bars purchased in the US, a luggage tag from a Costa Rican airline and books of matches from upscale hotels in Toronto, Vancouver and the United States.
He was evidently heading into the great wilderness of northern Ontario. But where, exactly, was he going? He clearly wasn't poor, but he wasn't dressed for a Canadian autumn. He had no hat, gloves or warm jacket. Perhaps he wasn't Canadian. Maybe he was mentally ill. Why didn't he have a wallet or cash in his pockets?
Five years later, the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and the Ontario coroner's office have been unable to put a name to the dead man. So his photo was posted, last week, on the OPP website under the banner of what is being called Project Resolve. Also posted were the blurry images, facial reconstructions and details of 31 other people who have died nameless in the province since 2000.
The hope is that people who have missing family or friends will visit the site and help solve the mystery of their identities. In addition to the 32 cases since 2000, the details of another 75 unidentified bodies - found as long ago as 1970 - also appear on the site.