MORE REMAINS FOUND AT HOME LINKED TO ALLEGED SERIAL KILLER.

TORONTO • Investigators clung to the steep edge of a ravine on Thursday, some on their hands and knees, as they scraped through heaps of dirt and brush searching for more human remains near a home in mid-town Toronto where accused serial killer Bruce Mcarthur worked as a landscaper.

Some remains were discovered at the property Wednesday afternoon, just hours after police resumed digging in the area for the first time in about five months, said Det. Sgt. Hank Idsinga.

“We have work to do ... linking them to the McArthur investigation, but I think geographically, where the remains were found, we’re not going to have much of an issue doing that,” Idsinga told reporters near the site where the remains were found.

Just a few metres away, about 20 police and forensic workers used spades and trowels to scoop compost found in the ravine into large plastic buckets, hauling it down the hill to sieve-like tables to a pair of anthropologists.

Investigators previously found the remains of seven men hidden in large planters at the home. Idsinga said the remains recovered Wednesday could be from one or more of those men.

Mcarthur, 66, has been charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of eight men with ties to Toronto’s gay village. The remains of one of those men — Majeed Kayhan — have yet to be found.

Mcarthur is alleged to have killed Kayhan, Selim Esen, Skandaraj Navaratnam, Andrew Kinsman, Dean Lisowick, Soroush Mahmudi, Abdulbasir Faizi and Kirushna Kanagaratnam.

A handful of neighbours gathered in the parkette across from the property Thursday morning, watching police come and go.

Song lyrics by the band The Alternate Routes appear to have been stencilled onto the home’s garage door.

“We are one, we are how we treat each other when the day is done,” they read.

Idsinga said police have searched about 100 properties with links to Mcarthur’s landscaping business and cadaver dogs found a few spots of interest but, after some “minor excavations,” nothing was found.

Several weeks ago, the dogs searched the ravine and found “multiple spots” of interest, Idsinga said.

Some trees had to be cleared from the area and it took weeks to co-ordinate the search with the City of Toronto, which is responsible for the ravine, to “take environmental issues into consideration,” he said.

The search is expected to continue for another week, the detective said.

The remains have been sent to the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service for examination, he said.

The identification process could involve fingerprints, dental records or DNA analysis, he said, which would take “days, weeks or months.”