Vancouver police say they are working with Dutch counterparts and Interpol to determine if an unidentified man who collapsed on the street in the Netherlands three years ago is a Canadian who went missing in B.C. in the 1990s.
Amsterdam police said in a news release on Monday that the man known as “Lucky” wasn’t carrying ID when he suffered a brain hemorrhage or stroke in 2023, leaving him unable to communicate.
They say in a video that the man has aphasia, meaning he has great difficulty speaking, and he’s been unable to provide investigators with information about his identity or address.
The release led to online speculation that Lucky, an English speaker who was also known on the streets as “Chris the Canadian,” might be John Russell Kenny, who was originally from Ontario but went missing in Vancouver in 1994 and would now be about 67.
Photos of Lucky and Kenny bear similarities and Vancouver police say they are working to determine if Kenny is the man with long white hair and a beard now lying a Dutch nursing home.
Const. Megan Lui, a Vancouver police spokeswoman, says the investigation is ongoing and they’ll provide an update “if a positive identification is made.”
Amsterdam police say two retired officers who are now volunteers with the department’s cold case team took over the case and have discovered Lucky had been a member of an Amsterdam Buddhist community.
An RCMP missing persons description says Kenny was 34 years old on May 22, 1994, when he went missing from Vancouver, where he was living with no fixed address.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 19, 2026.
By Brieanna Charlebois | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.