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Nick Hickey needed his daily walks. Every day. Multiple times a day. They calmed him, relieved his stress, gave him time to collect his thoughts and cope. He walked his support dog, Nico, mostly, but some times he walked alone.

Hickey, 17, was fatally struck by a driver Wednesday night during what police allege was a frenzied spree through Bells Corners that only ended once police arrested a man who was found naked after breaking into a nearby Jeep.

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Hickey was on one of his walks near Seyton Drive and Hammill Court, just minutes from his home, where his family slept through the night thinking he would come back, as he usually did.

At 4 a.m. Thursday, Tracy Mellon awoke to the loud pounding of two Ottawa police officers at her door, there to tell her that her son was dead.

“He was the second half of me,” Hickey’s 11-year-old sister Vicky Mellon said Thursday evening in tears. She and her brother shared a love of drawing. “I thought I had nothing, but now I know I had everything. I had everything in life. I had a brother, I had food, I had a roof.”