Police probe woman's deadly fall

Photo: CTV

A 19-year-old woman is dead and her common-law partner is in custody after she fell from the 26th floor of a Surrey highrise early New Year’s Day.

Police were called to a possible domestic disturbance in the 13000-block of 100 Avenue just after 1 a.m. Wednesday.

“Our members were responding and while they were in the process of responding they saw a female fall from very high up in the building and hit the ground,” Insp. Dan Splinter said.

The young woman died from her injuries.

Kathy Stavem, who lives just a few floors above the suite where the couple lived, said she was watching television at the time when her husband heard a loud noise.

“He heard some kind of loud bang or something like that, and he looked at me and goes ‘What the heck was that?’” she said.

“We’re on the 30th floor and he looked down, and we saw the body.”

Police arrested the 19-year-old woman’s common law partner, a 23-year-old man, in connection with the incident. Charges have not been laid and the Integrated Homicide Investigation Team has since taken over the case.

Investigators aren’t saying whether they think the victim was pushed to her death.

"Right now the circumstances are suspicious,” said IHIT Sgt. Adam McIntosh. “There is a family who is grieving. We want to find out what happened and we want to find out the truth"

Splinter said one of the witnesses in the suite the woman fell from is cooperating with officials, and police are looking for anyone else who witnessed the horrific incident.

Anyone with information is asked to call the IHIT tipline at 1-877-551-4448 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477.