The death of a man on the Blood First Nation is sparking debate about caring for the Nation's homeless population.
Firefighters came across human remains while attending to a grass fire on Tuesday night.
"It was a complaint of a grass fire to begin with, and then the fire crew that was extinguishing the fire located a burnt body," said Sgt. Bruno Rossi.
Residents say the man burned to death in a grass fire that likely started when he dropped a cigarette.
A patch of burned grass, old cans and discarded furniture, surrounded by yellow police tape is all that is left of the scene.
Police say the 54-year-old man was positively identified by using medical records.
They are not releasing his name, but local residents have identified him as Eldon Creighton, who was known to frequent the area.
According to Blood Tribe Police an autopsy confirms the death was non-criminal in nature and their investigation has been concluded.
People who live nearby say the tragedy should be a wakeup call for the entire community.
Joyce Healy says leaders need to deal with the serious social issues on the reserve.
"We had a community cleanup on Saturday, this past Saturday, and as far as I was concerned that area should have been cleaned up because it's a well known fact that the people that are at least homeless in the community of Moses Lake, that's where they go," said Healy, "If that site had been cleaned up at least that garbage would have all been gone, and possibly they wouldn't have been going over there."
Healy says the other problem is that the emergency shelter has been shut down for the summer.
Residents in Moses Lake say the local shelter closed several weeks ago.
Since then the man who died and others like him have been forced back out onto the street.
Some residents are convinced that if the shelter had been open, the tragedy could have been prevented.
Residents say they've heard that the band may consider re-opening the shelter because of the tragedy.
