Vigil tonight for slain woman

Laura Young’s friends and neighbours will gather on a Cannon Street East corner Thursday night to remember a woman described as a well known panhandler and “…a downtown fixture.”

Young’s battered body was found in a snowbank behind a home at 116 Cathcart St. just after 9 a.m. Wednesday. She had been slain.

Friends today described 37-year-old Laura Ann Young as a “harmless person” who seemed troubled.

They will gather at 8 p.m. at the intersection of Cannon Street East at Wellington Street North – in the middle of the area where she was often seen and occasionally handed out flyers for the Beasley Neighbourhood Association.

“She was just known as a member of our community,” said one of the organizers. “She needed help but she helped others when she could.

Brandi Brons, who lives in one of the three apartments in the two-storey brick home where Young’s body was found, said her boyfriend made the grisly discovery when he went searching for the couple’s missing bucket filled with salt and sand, which usually sits beside their door.