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Search efforts start again for Richard Tssessaze

Since Nov. 6, a renewed search has been underway for missing Lac Brochet band councillor, 37-year-old Richard Joseph Tssessaze, who disappeared June 26.

Since Nov. 6, a renewed search has been underway for missing Lac Brochet band councillor, 37-year-old Richard Joseph Tssessaze, who disappeared June 26.

Northlands Denesuline First Nation Chief Joe Dantouze, with a search party of 20 people led by Ivan Harper, are currently in their final search before the winter for Tssessaze, who was reported as missing when he failed to pick up his pay cheque from Dantouze, who says he is fairly certain Tssessaze didn't have any money with him at the time he went missing and hasn't contacted anyone in his family or his girlfriend.

Tssessaze had arrived in Winnipeg from his girlfriend's residence in Brandon on June 14. The 5'11, 240-pound man was last seen on June 26 in the downtown area of Winnipeg, wearing a black t-shirt and black dress pants. The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs says Tssessaze has suffered from head trauma and might have been disoriented when he went missing.

Dantouze is calling on the search and rescue and major crime unit of the Winnipeg Police Service to help out with the search, saying that although police have been investigating, they have "not helped with an area search to date." Grand Chief of Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) David Harper is helping to organize the search.

"With winter coming soon, there is urgency about finding something, anything that could lead to locating him," Harper says.

The search is being centred on the Red River behind CanWest Global Park, where Northlands Elder Leonard Daniels says he has found clues indicating that the location is where Tssessaze may have gone missing.

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