by Jennifer Pritchett
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jan20/97) - A young girl was found unconscious in a Fort Smith snowbank last weekend, the second such incident in the community in as many days.

The teenager was found less than a kilometre from where 16-year-old Rufus Rabesca was found dead, according to the people who rescued her Sunday afternoon.

Jamie Baxter, 14, came across the girl's unconscious body while on his snowmachine just after 5 p.m.

"I found her on a deserted road behind Axe Handle Hill, not far from where the guy was found on Monday," he said.

Knowing the girl needed a doctor, Baxter went for help.

"I thought she was dead when I first saw her," said Garry Foote, who runs the Extended Hand food bank in Fort Smith. "I couldn't get her pulse for more than a minute, and when I did, it was really slow. She was unconscious and then she went into convulsions."

Foote said that it might be more than a coincidence she was found in the same area as Rabesca.

"I'm wondering if they were at the same party," he said.

Sources say that Rabesca had been at a party Saturday night drinking and then left to walk home. His body was found last Monday evening.

However, RCMP in Fort Smith said the two cases are not related.

Foote said the girl was wearing a lightweight leather jacket with no gloves or hat, and likely would have died if Baxter hadn't seen her.

"We took our jackets off to get her warm," he said. "Unless she came to, she would have died."