Suspect arrested after stabbing death of Solomon Odekunle

A 21-year-old man was stabbed to death in Ottawa overnight, causing a sprawling crime scene that cut the busy intersection of St. Laurent Boulevard and Ogilive Road in half for hours on Sunday as police pieced together what happened.

SolomonOdekunlehas been identified as the man killed, police said.His death marks the city's17thhomicide of 2016.

A 27-year-old man is in custody and expected to appear in court Monday, police said late Sunday afternoon.

Police were called to the scene just before 2:30 a.m., butpolice tape remained stretched across the usually traffic-heavy intersection late intothe afternoon.

Staff Sgt. Bruce Pirtof the major crimes unitsaid police are working to determine a timeline of events, and called on any witnesses to come forward.

Investigators know something happenedin front of Piper's Bar and Grill,but don't knowif it started there, ended there or happened partway through and can't say yet whether or not a fight spilled out from inside the bar.

Evidence markers peppered the pavement outside the bar, then curved their way across St. Laurent Boulevard to the Coventry Road median. More markers snaked diagonallythrough a parking lot near the bar, stopping at Cyrville Road.

"We're not sure if it's all evidence but let's capture it, both on camera and physically, and we'll decide later on what really is evidence and what isn't,"Pirt said.

"Right now let's keep the scene big and gather everything we can because we only have one crack at a scene."

Pirt said it's a big scene because they have to analyze all the blood and potential evidence, but they'retrying to narrow it down.

"We do have some bloodletting that covered quite an extensive area, we have to make sure it's all connected to the same incident," he said.

"As we investigate further we'll be able to tighten up that scene and make it smaller and smaller."

He added that police have been gathering video evidence from "a number of establishments" surrounding the crime scene.

Some businesses had to close Sunday due to the large crime scene, includingMobile Pressure Cleaning, which is behind Piper's. Owner DaveDelauniere, who had been at that location since 2008, saidhe's surprised but doesn't have any safety concerns.

"It's an industrial area, [a] commercial area so no, I've had no problems here," Delauniere said.