Updated at 1:01 p.m. ET: A teenager was killed when he leaped over a waist-high wall to evade a pursuing police officer, only for both to plunge more than 30 yards into Niagara Gorge.

Ryan Dube, 18, was killed and the officer with the Niagara Regional Police Service suffered a broken leg in the incident at about 5 p.m. on Tuesday, authorities said.

During the chase, both of them mistakenly hopped a retaining wall and Dube fell to his death, they said.

His body was found about three hours later after a massive rescue effort that focused on Niagara Gorge less than a mile downstream from the famed falls, authorities said.

'The kid went off the ledge'
Dube fled from the officer who stopped him for questioning regarding violations of his curfew that was a condition of his probation, said JoAnne Turner, director of the Boys and Girls Club of Niagara, Canada.

"Apparently in an effort to flee the police officer, he went over and the police officer went right after him," she said.

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Witnesses told news outlets they saw the police officer jump out of his vehicle to pursue the young man on foot.

"The kid went off the ledge, and the cop went with him," the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. quoted witness Logan Tremblay as saying.

"I ran over the ledge to see if I could grab the cop or if the cop was still on the ledge, and as I looked, the cop was going. Like I saw part of his uniform and then it disappeared," Tremblay added.

"He was pursuing the suspect but for some reason, and this is probably strange to most people around here, is why the officer would have jumped over the wall too knowing how dangerous it is there. It’s kind of a mystery," local resident Ermanno Ceniccola told Toronto's National Post newspaper.

According to Canadian law enforcement officials, the officer suffered a broken leg and was airlifted to a nearby trauma center.

The Toronto Star said Niagara police identified the officer as Const. Jacob Smits. The National Post said Smits remained hospitalized in serious condition.

"It's a very treacherous little stretch," Turner said, recalling incidents in which tourists straddle the wall for a better view of the falls before realizing the danger.

From May: Man becomes third to survive plunge at Niagara Falls

An independent investigation into the police's role in the incident will be conducted by Ontario's Special Investigations Unit, which was contacted by local police following the death in accordance with provincial law.

Dube was originally from  St. Catharines, Ontario, local reports said.

Father: He was trying to turn his life around
Turner said Dube had been staying at a local youth home, where staff said he had no behavioral trouble other than occasionally missing curfew.

"He was very well-liked by staff and residents," she said. "He was making good progress."

She said she did not know why Dube was on probation.

"It's just tragic," she said. "There's no other word to describe it."

Dube's father, Jean Paul Dube, told the Star that his son had been troubled and was in and out of jail, but was trying to turn his life around.

"He was making some good changes until this happened," he told the newspaper.

Reuters contributed to this report. 

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More than a dozen people were hospitalized after lightning struck an outdoor food festival in Whitby, Ontario, on Sunday, according to Canadian news reports.

Lightning struck a tent at the Whitby Ribfest, about 40 miles east of Toronto, just before 2 p.m. ET, leaving at least 17 people injured, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.

It quoted organizers as saying the weather changed rapidly, leaving many at the event to squeeze under a tent moment before the strike.

One of those struck, Bill Sandiford, told the CBC: "The tent was absolutely packed full of people. It was so painful, yet the pain was gone so fast. The pain didn't linger.”

Durham police Sgt. Al Valks told the Toronto Star seven people were rushed to the hospital while the other 10 made their own way there. All of them suffered burn wounds from the strike.

"Apparently the electricity went through their feet up through their bodies. It was painful," he told the newspaper.

Steve Peddle and his wife Rose were inside the dining tent when the strike happened.

"You see the flash and it sounded like a bomb (went off) exactly at the same time," he told the Star. "It was so loud."

Organizer Colin Regan said the event tents had lightning rods on top and had prepared for stormy weather.

The Durham region had been under a severe thunderstorm warning Sunday.

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At least four people were injured when the roof of a shopping mall in Ontario, Canada, collapsed Saturday afternoon, officials said.

The roof was used for parking at the two-story Algo Centre Mall in Elliot Lake, about 335 miles northwest of Toronto. CBC News quoted a witness as saying cars had plunged through the roof.

"You can see the roof with the cars hanging inside," Joe Drazil, identified as a Zellers employee at the mall, told the CBC.

Mayor Rick Hamilton told CBC that four people were taken to the hospital. A fire official reached by Reuters said emergency workers were still searching for possible victims.

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Cora Richer / The Canadian Press via AP

A woman checks out the damage after a roof collapsed at the Algo Centre Mall in Elliot Lake, Ontario, on Saturday

Mall manager Rhonda Bear told CBC News that repairs had been done to the roof over the last year, but not "any huge structural repairs" to the part that collapsed. She also told CBC that the mall owners, Toronto-based Eastwood Mall Inc., ordered a structural study a month ago that she said turned up nothing.

But the CBC said the Elliot Lake Standard newspaper has reported that the mall had had roof leaks for years.

This article includes reporting by msnbc.com staff and Reuters.

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Police in Ontario, Canada say they will hold a man who allegedly swallowed a $20,000 diamond for as long as it takes for him to produce the evidence.

It has been nearly a week since Richard Mackenzie Matthews, 52, is alleged to have switched a diamond at Precision Jewellers and swallowed the real one. 

Matthews has been held at police headquarters while they wait for the 1.7-carat stone to pass through his system.

Sgt. Brett Corey said Thursday that Matthews has gone to the washroom numerous times, but the diamond hasn't passed. 

Corey says a recent X-ray showed a pair of fake diamonds, or cubic zirconiums, stuck in the man's intestines but because a diamond is translucent, it isn't visible.

He says the suspect is eager to get the ordeal over with and is co-operating. In the early stages, Corey says Matthews was being given laxative type foods, but is now being fed whatever he wants, in an effort to get things moving. 

Matthews is charged with theft and breach of court conditions, and is also wanted on warrants in Toronto. 

“We’re still waiting him out, but at this point, we don’t have anything to show for it,” Corey told the Toronto Sun.

The Windsor Star newspaper said the grim task could not be forced on a rookie detective. 

“It’s not like a hazing or ‘you’re the junior guy, in you go,’” Deputy Chief Jerome Brannagan told the newspaper. "Whoever is involved in that has to be somebody who is qualified to give evidence in court. They’re going to have to articulate what happened, how it happened, how they recovered it. The chain of evidence has to be maintained.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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