By Matt Robinson and Joanne Lee-Young, Vancouver Sun
Police in upstate New York are expected to release more information today after a university student from North Vancouver, Matthew Hutchinson, and two other people were found dead in a home south of Rochester early Sunday.
The police identified 24-year-old Hutchinson, who was in his fourth year at State University of New York at Geneseo.
The hockey player previously spent time with several teams in the BCHL junior-A league, including two games with the Surrey Eagles during the 2008-09 season, according to his profile at hockeydb.com. Most of his games in the league were with Coquitlam Express and Chilliwack Chiefs.
The events that led to Hutchinson’s death remain under investigation. The two other victims were 21-year-old Kelsey Annese from Webster, N.Y., and 24-year-old Colin Kingston of Geneseo.
It was Dan Kingston, the father of Colin, who called 911 to report the situation, police told a reporter for the Livingston County News early Monday. The worried father told the dispatcher his son told him he had killed his girlfriend and was going to kill himself, according to U.S. media outlets.
The call led Geneseo Police to the grisly discovery of the three bodies in a house near the State University of New York at Geneseo.
Annese and Hutchinson were students at Geneseo, according to the school. Kingston was a former student.
Police called the tragedy an isolated incident. They did not say how the three victims knew each other. No firearm was used, but a knife was recovered at the scene, according to police. There were other people in the house when officers arrived, but police made no arrests and were not seeking any suspects as of Sunday afternoon.
A spokesman for the Geneseo Police Department told a Sunday news conference that of the three bodies found, one may be a perpetrator. No cause of deaths has been determined.
Friends and family took to social media to post their thoughts after Hutchinson’s death.
“A ray of light of light has been extinguished but never forgotten. The embers will always glow in our hearts,” wrote Nanette Scudamore about the loss of her nephew.
“His dreams were all coming true. This should not have happened,” wrote Leah Nicole.
“RIP Hutch, lots of good memories playing hockey with you, fitness class, rolling around in the 4runner bumping tunes. Taken from us too soon. Thoughts and prayers go out to you and your family,” wrote White Rock man Scott Durham.
The university issued a release calling the deaths a “terrible tragedy.”
Hutchinson played defence for SUNY Geneseo’s hockey team, the Knights, and had an assist Saturday evening when the team defeated Franklin Pierce 6-2 in New Hampshire.
The young man was studying geography and business at the school. He was a firefighter with the B.C. Wildfire Branch and more recently with the Geneseo Fire Department.
Fire Chief Andrew Chanler told the Vancouver Sun he and other members of the volunteer department were “in shock and disbelief with the loss of Matt.”
He said Hutchinson was a big part of the local hockey community and among the upper echelon of firefighters at the department, which he joined in 2012.
“I was pretty close to him,” Chanler said. “He was truly a role model. He was a guy who you’d say ‘wow, he is really making a difference in the world.’ He is an inspiration for taking on the things he did while going to school full time.”
