Small-town Ontario neighbours say they never saw the missing LaSalle girl nearby

The three-year-old girl who vanished from Montreal on Sunday was found alive near a highway in rural Ontario, beside land owned by a local farming family. But they had no idea she was there.
'We saw it on the news. The camera turned and we said, 'Hey, that's our place,'' said Louis Racine, who farms near Casselman. 'It's strange. You'd expect something like this to happen in Montreal or Ottawa, not here.'
The girl was found next to the Racines' cornfield, which runs along Highway 417. Their house and barn are on the other side of the highway, but they can see the field and road from their front window. Still, Racine said police never came to speak with them.
'We only found out from the media,' he said.
The child was located shortly after 2 p.m. Wednesday by an Ontario Provincial Police drone, nearly 72 hours after she was reported missing. She was alone but conscious, and was taken to hospital for assessment.
No drinkable water nearby
The Racines said they plant corn in May and do not return to the field until September to harvest. The land is left undisturbed during the summer.
'We don't go in that field much,' said Racine's son, Étienne, the seventh generation on the farm. 'But if someone's lying in the middle of it, you'd expect to see that.'
Much of the grass along the highway is about two feet high. Étienne Racine said that if the child was lying low in a ditch beside the road, she might have been difficult to spot from their side.
He added that there is no drinkable water nearby, only a shallow runoff creek.
Neighbours along the same stretch of highway said they were equally surprised, though most declined to speak on the record.
'I would've thought someone might have seen her,' said one man. 'It's a small community. We all talk to each other.'
A gas station and motel are down the road. Daniel Lepage, who was staying at the motel, said he could not believe how close the girl had been.
'I remember seeing a woman with a little girl on Sunday,' he said. 'But I don't know if it was her.'
He said he was surprised police found her alive but that many unanswered questions remain.
At a joint press conference Wednesday evening, Quebec and Ontario police described the discovery as the best possible scenario in a case that had captured national attention.
Police credited public tips with helping narrow the search zone.
The girl's father later posted a brief message online, thanking the public for their support and asking for privacy.
Her mother, a 34-year-old woman from Montreal, has been charged with child abandonment. Police have not explained how the child ended up in Ontario.
The investigation is ongoing.

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