Arrest in Karissa case only the beginning

Sudden death is always difficult, especially in a small community, and it takes a long time for closure to occur.

We hope the beginning of such a process is now underway in Bridgewater. After more than four months of intense investigation, police arrested and charged Penny Boudreau on Friday with the murder of her 12-year-old daughter Karissa.

When Karissa Boudreau went missing in late January there was an understandable pall associated with the disappearance because people just don’t vanish in rural Nova Scotia, especially young girls wearing only a black hoodie, vest, blue jeans and pink crocs in wintry conditions.

When Karissa’s frozen body was found Feb. 9 by the LaHave River, a community’s worst fears were confirmed and a province mourned the sudden and inexplicable death of someone so young.

There was apprehension in the region that a killer was loose and a realistic sense that no one was truly safe until police found Karissa’s murderer. Sad to say, their investigation zeroed in at last on the one who gave her life.

There’s little doubt there will be equal measure of public outrage and disbelief in the aftermath of the arrest. Time has done nothing to erase the shock of this murder and it has loomed large prior to last Friday as an unsolved matter with no resolution or relief for Karissa’s family or for a public keen to know that its own children would be safe.

The arrest addresses that problem and police say their investigation has yielded sufficient evidence to warrant the charge of first-degree, or premeditated, murder.

More problematic perhaps in terms of public perception and immediate reaction to the arrest was the accused’s emotional press conference two days after Karissa disappeared, when she appealed for help in finding her child.

We suspect a stunned public will return time and again to that moment and wonder how anyone could make such an appeal if complicit in a crime. It’s a mystery that will likely remain unresolved, and we hasten to add that no matter the sense of the situation at this point, all individuals before the court are innocent until proven guilty and it would be wrong to jump to any conclusion before the evidence is heard and the accused tried.

Still, how truly sad and disheartening to know that situations similar to this are part of the societal fabric, where children are at risk not only from the world outside but occasionally from within what should be the safest haven of all; the family unit.

Despite the arrest Friday and what it means to the citizens of Bridgewater and surrounding area, it’s extremely hard to feel any satisfaction.

Police allege a mother has killed her child and although such a circumstance warrants shock and revulsion, it also demands profound sorrow and regret because something somehow has gone terribly wrong and we are collectively that much poorer for it as a society.