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Cause of Toronto police officer's death confirmed as drowning

Cause of Toronto police officer's death confirmed as drowning

The cause of Const. Darius Garda's death has been confirmed as drowning, Toronto police say.

Garda's body was pulled from Lake Ontario near Polson Pier on Thursday, not far from the scene of a fatal shooting he was involved in nearly six years ago.

Investigators are not treating his death as suspicious, police said Friday. On Thursday, CBC News learned that police are investigating his death as a suicide.

Garda had most recently been working out of 51 Division, officers told CBC News.

Police were called to the waterfront in the Polson Street and Cherry Street area around 4 p.m. ET Wednesday for a report of a man having fallen into the water.

Shortly after noon Thursday, police confirmed they had pulled a body from the lake.

"This really resonates with our officers, and we've lost a member of our policing family," police union head Mike McCormack said Thursday.

Garda's body was found close to the location of the shooting of a civilian, an incident involving Garda, that happened back on April 19, 2010.

Police had pursued Wieslaw Duda, a 50-year-old father of two, through the city's east end before cornering his car at Cherry Street and Commissioners Street.

Police opened fire on Duda after he clipped an officer with his car.

At the time, Duda's friends and family told the CBC's John Lancaster that Duda was taking medication for schizophrenia.

The province's Special Investigations Unit concluded there were "no reasonable grounds" to lay charges.