Canadian in Taiwan found decapitated
Body found just months after his wife’s drowning
Months after his wife drowned in front of his eyes, Ryan Ramgahan was still posting photos of some of their fondest memories on Facebook.
Ramgahan and Cat Yen were on a small inflatable boat with their dogs off the coast of Taiwan in Yilan went they ran into a storm that was so powerful the boat capsized. Although a man on a nearby boat was able to rescue Ramgahan, a Canadian who moved to Taipei 10 years ago to teach English, he would never see his wife or his dog, Spongy, again.
“I’m trying really hard to be positive,” Ramgahan told his best friend, Tom Bartnik, back in Canada. “I’m not in a hurry to go and be with Cat in heaven any time soon.”
On Wednesday, New Taipei City police were called to a river embankment where Ramgahan’s torso had been found. They located his severed head, one arm and one leg in three plastic bags nearby. The other leg has since been recovered, Taiwan foreign affairs police Sub-Lt. Huang Yu-tzu told the National Post Thursday.
Beside his body, police discovered a large knife that they are analyzing as the potential murder weapon.
Two of Ramgahan’s friends found his torso after they went looking for him on Wednesday, Yu-tzu said. According to the Taiwan News, the two men hadn’t heard from Ramgahan since last Sunday. Instead of finding Ramgahan at his apartment, the friends found his dog Lulu outside with deep lacerations on its nose. The dog’s injuries are part of the investigation, Yu-tzu confirmed.
The two took the dog to look for Ramgahan along Zhongzheng Riverside Park, his usual walking route. There, the dog reportedly led them to its owner’s torso.
The homicide is being investigated in connection to drugs and may have been the result of a drug deal gone bad, the Taiwan News reported. According to the paper, Ramgahan had been arrested in March for possession of 200 grams of marijuana. Yu-tzu, however, would not confirm this or speak on Ramgahan’s past.
The next steps, she said, are to trace his movements in the days before he died using CCTV footage.
“We will start to investigate Ryan’s family and friends and his background, his financial situations,” Yutzu said. “We will also use CCTV to find out where Ryan went and who did he connect with.”
Global Affairs Canada confirmed a Canadian citizen “was murdered” in Taiwan and that consular officials are assisting the family.
Ramgahan was born to Guyanese immigrants in Alberta but moved to Mississauga, Ont., when he was young. He attended Port Credit Secondary School in the Toronto suburb and was popular in high school, according to Bartnik.
His friends describe him as the “joker” of the group.
“He was always doing silly stuff like pranks,” Bartnik said. “He’d be the guy putting up rabbit ears behind you when you’re taking a picture, you know.”
Ramgahan’s friends remember being at parties where he would smoke marijuana — but never to an extreme. To their knowledge, he never sold drugs.
What stuck out about Ramgahan, said his friend Shawn Seegulam, was how no one could ever tell if he was upset, because he was always smiling.
After high school, Ramgahan held a variety of jobs. He worked in a muffler factory with Bartnik, as a delivery driver and as a technician at a factory producing ultrasound gel. Having never gone to university, Ramgahan moved to Taiwan for a better life, Seegulam said.
And he found it. His job as an English teacher at a Taipei school was well paid. Shortly after moving, he met Yen, who had moved there from B.C. What was likely supposed to be a brief stint in Taiwan became permanent when they married. The couple never had children — Ramgahan didn’t want them. The couple treated their pets like the children they never had, Bartnik said.
So it was even more crushing when Ramgahan lost both last year. While Yen drowned in the storm that capsized their boat, the couple’s dachshund, “Spongy,” was wearing a life-vest and was seen swimming to a nearby island. For months, Ramgahan posted ads offering $4,200 for Spongy’s return.
“He was devastated because in his mind, he’d known his wife was gone, but he still had that hope to find the dog,” Bartnik said.
According to the Taiwan News, one day before he was found dead, Ramgahan withdrew from the bank the same amount as the reward. Yu-tzu would only say that “it’s also a detail that’s under investigation.”