Indignity to human remains charge filed against Kamloops lawyer as homicide investigation unfolds

Butch Bagabuyo seen in this photo from Kamloops Collaborative Family Law Association.

A Kamloops lawyer has been charged with indignity to human remains as RCMP continue working on what began as a missing persons case and has since become a homicide investigation.

Butch Bagabuyo, 54, who practices family law and mediation, was arrested after police discovered a deceased man inside a van parked at a property on Monterey Place near Hillside Drive.

According to a news release, Kamloops RCMP accuse Bagabuyo of placing the body in a plastic bin.

The dead man has since been identified as 60-year-old Mohd Abdullah, a Thompson Rivers University lecturer who was reported missing when he didn’t show up to work on Monday, March 14.

Initially RCMP said the missing persons investigation had become a suspicious death investigation. They have since called it a homicide.

Police released security camera images showing Abdullah walking in downtown Kamloops on Friday, March 11, the last day he was known to be alive.

They would like residents and businesses to review their own security camera footage from that date in order to help them determine where Abdullah went that evening.

“Even if people don’t think it’s relevant, you never know what’s going to be the clue to help proceed with an investigation like this so we always encourage people to make that call,” Kamloops RCMP Const. Crystal Evelyn said in a telephone interview with CTV News.

Police also released a photo of a white GMC rental van with BC licence plate PJ 9131 and ask anyone who may have seen it over the last week in Kamloops, or surrounding communities, to give them a call.

“We are looking to track the movements of that van from last week,” said Evelyn. “We do have the van now so if people see one driving around now that is not the one we are looking for.”

She also said a search at another Kamloops home is connected to the Abdullah homicide investigation.

CTV News has confirmed the property where that took place belongs to Bagabuyo.

The indignity to human remains charge against the lawyer has not been tested in court, and at this time, nobody has been charged with Abdullah’s murder.