U.S. authorities have confirmed they are investigating a Minnesota man's connection to the suicide of Carleton University student Nadia Kajouji after reviewing the transcript of an e-mail conversation about taking her life.
The Minnesota Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) unit said in a news release Thursday evening that police were tipped off that a person had been counselling people over the Internet to kill themselves last year.
Police allege 46-year-old Minnesota resident William Francis Melchert-Dinkle was involved in suicide conversations over the Internet with at least one person outside the United States. They have not charged him with any crime.
Investigators say that information taken from a computer led them to contact Ottawa police. It was discovered that Kajouji, 18, was in contact with their suspect just prior to her disappearance on March 9, 2008.
Sadly, her body was found six weeks later in the Rideau River, behind St. Paul's University. Her parents knew she was heartbroken from a recent break-up, but they did not know she was on medications and was receiving counselling.
Her father, Mohamad Kajouji, told CTV Toronto Thursday that he is a broken man over his daughter's death and said his daughter was in contact with a "sick person."
Kajouji said that he saw in police transcripts that his daughter went online to talk about her depression and she believed she was talking to another suicidal woman.
But he said the person his daughter was talking to wanted her to hang herself in front of a webcam.
"He wanted to watch her kill herself on her camera," Kajouji said.
Ottawa police have provided information to Minnesota authorities that is being used in the current U.S. investigation.
"During the course of our investigation, we came across several online conversations that Nadia was having with a variety individuals in the United States and at that time we followed up as part of the regular course of our investigation," Ottawa Police Staff Sgt. Uday Jaswal told CTV.ca on Thursday.
"So that is one piece of the information. I believe the authorities in Minnesota have a number of other pieces of information that they are working with and it's linked up -- and that's what has generated this investigation now," he added.
Janell Rasmussen, a spokesperson for Minnesota's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, told CTV.ca earlier on Thursday that her organization was working with the St. Paul Police Department on the case involving Kajouji's online conversation.
"We are working with local investigators here on this case and we're providing investigative assistance," she said in a telephone interview from Minnesota.
Rasmussen said St. Paul's Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force is also involved in the investigation because of its capabilities to investigate crimes involving computers.
While Rasmussen would not comment on what charges may be laid in the case, Kajouji's family told the Toronto Star on Wednesday that Minnesota investigators may soon lay charges in connection with their daughter's death.
With a report from CTV Toronto's Austin Delaney
