MONTREAL - A human head was found in a west-end park on Sunday, QMI Agency has learned, but it was not immediately clear if there's a link to the Luka Magnotta body-parts case.

The head was found on the shore of a lake in Angrignon park, a few kilometres south of Magnotta's apartment where his lover, Jun Lin, was killed in late May.

A large number of police officers and detectives were on the scene Sunday and a forensic identification truck was seen in the park.

The entire area was closed to the public.

Montreal police spokeswoman Anie Lemieux confirmed a discovery was made in the park Sunday morning but she wouldn't say if it was a human head.

"The major crimes squad investigators were in the park, they got information that led them there," Lemieux told QMI Agency.

"They found something that they have given to the coroner's office. It's too early to say if it's linked to the homicide case, the Magnotta case that we all know."

She added that the item found near the lake would be examined in the coming
days. Test results are expected to be completed within a week.

Police have told the Lin family about the discovery, a source told QMI.

The Chinese student was cut to pieces, his body parts mailed to the offices of Canadian political parties in Ottawa and public schools in Vancouver.

The head is the only part that has not been officially accounted for in the gory case that made headlines around the world.

Magnotta, born Eric Clinton Newman, is a former small-time porn actor who grew up in east-end Toronto and Lindsay, Ont., northeast of the city.

The 29-year-old was briefly considered the world's most wanted man after a janitor found Lin's torso outside Magnotta's west-end Montreal apartment.

The case took a grisly turn when a video was posted to a gore website that shows a man tied to a bed, stabbed to death with an ice pick and dismembered.

Police say the victim in the video is Jun Lin.

Magnotta fled to Europe following the murder and a manhunt extended to Paris and then to Berlin, where the suspect was arrested six days later.

He was extradited to Canada under unprecedented security and has pleaded not-guilty to first-degree murder and other charges.

Magnotta is being kept in solitary confinement pending a preliminary hearing scheduled for March.