OTTAWA - Body parts found in the mail in Ottawa on Tuesday are believed to be from a male whose dismembered torso was discovered tossed out with garbage in Montreal.

The horrific case is now being investigated by Montreal police, with assistance from detectives in Ottawa. Police in Montreal are expected to issue an update Wednesday afternoon.

"The investigators have reason to believe that there is a link but there's nothing proven yet," a Montreal police source told QMI Agency. "The investigation was transferred from Ottawa to Montreal.

There is no medico-legal link that has been done, the test results have not come back yet to connect the hand and the foot.

"But investigators have evidence and they are looking at these elements to see if there is a link between all of this."

Earlier Wednesday, sources in Montreal said police expect to be able to quickly identify a suspect through evidence at the scene where the torso was found, without limbs and head, stuffed in a suitcase and left among a large pile of garbage outside a building in the Snowdon neighbourhood.

The caretaker of the Place Lucy building found the body on Tuesday morning after receiving complaints about a strong smell coming from a garbage pile.

The janitor said the suitcase had been there for at least a week.

New "investigative elements that point to the identification of a suspect," were announced by Simon Delorme, a spokesman for Montreal Police, late Tuesday. "A close analyses of the scene revealed a lot of information."

While Montreal police were investigating the torso, two equally horrifying discoveries were being made in mailed packages in two separate Ottawa locations. Wednesday morning, police confirmed both packages, one containing a severed human foot, the other a human hand, had originated in the Montreal area.

The severed foot was found Tuesday morning at the 130 Albert St. headquarters of the Conservative Party of Canada. A CPC staffer made the gruesome discovery after partially opening a box in the day's mail delivery.

The staffer was overwhelmed by a horrid stench, and immediately alerted police.

Once it was determined that the bloodstained package contained human remains, the Ottawa Police Major Crimes unit was called in. Late Tuesday, police carried a yellow bag out of Tory headquarters and confirmed a human foot was in the box.

Later Tuesday, Ottawa police investigators confirmed the discovery of the second body part, a human hand. Police have not said where it was being sent to, but the package was discovered at an Ottawa Canada Post facility.

Sources told QMI Agency an "alert postal worker" noticed the package because of its markings and a putrid stench. Police wouldn't confirm the markings were a hand-drawn heart - nor would they confirm whether notes were sent with the decomposing limbs.

The discovery left many workers shaken, and their unease had not abated on Wednesday. Postal workers at the sorting plant called the discovery of human body parts disturbing.

"It's a little unsettling," said one employee. "Personally, I don't like it."

Security guards roamed the perimeter of the facility on Wednesday, which appeared to be running business as usual. Several postal workers, including workers at another nearby Canada Post property, said they had been ordered not to talk to media.

One worker talking to media on Wednesday was ordered away by a loud security guard and left.
Police have not speculated or commented on what might have happened to the other missing limbs, or the victim's head.

- With files from Daniel Proussalidis, Paule Vielleux-Turcotte, QMI Agency