The two young brothers were having a sleepover at their best friend’s home in Campbellton, N.B., camped out in the living room as they so often did.

Only on Monday morning, they never woke up.

Connor and Noah Barthe, aged 7 and 5, were found dead after an African rock python escaped from its enclosure in a pet shop and strangled them in their friend’s apartment during the night.

The two-storey building with the apartment also houses Reptile Ocean, the exotic pet shop owned by their friend’s father, Jean-Claude Savoie.

RCMP Const. Julie Rogers-Marsh said the python apparently slithered into the ventilation system and ended up in the living room, where the boys were sleeping.

The police were called shortly after dawn to the building on Pleasant St. in the town of about 7,500 near Quebec’s Gaspe, and when officers arrived about 6:30 a.m. they found the pair dead.

“The preliminary investigation has determined that the two boys were strangled by the snake,” said Rogers-Marsh.

“There are no words to say that could sum up the joy and love they brought us all,” Melissa Ellis, a family friend, told the Star.

“They were loved by every hand that touched them and the heavens said it all today as even the angels were crying,” she said, alluding to the rain falling Monday.

Tributes for the boys and their mother immediately began to pour onto Facebook.

Their mother, Mandy Trecartin, lives close to the Reptile Ocean store. The Campbellton Tribune identified their father as Andrew Barthe of Dalhousie, about 25 kilometres away.

Savoie, the pet shop owner, told Global News that the dead boys were his “best friend’s kids” and they were like an extended family.

Audibly upset, Savoie said the kids often camped out in the living room, where they’d play X-Box and set up forts out of mattresses and sofa cushions.

He told Global he went to check on them around 6 a.m.

“I thought they were sleeping until I seen the hole in the ceiling. Everything had fallen, and I turned the lights on and I seen this horrific scene.”

Savoie said it appeared the snake, which he obtained around 2000, fell through a grill in the ventilation system into the living room. He found it nearby and turned it over to authorities.

The Mounties confirmed the large snake is in their possession.

“I have so many mixed emotions right now it’s ridiculous. I can’t believe this is real,” Savoie told Global. “I feel like they’re my kids.”

Autopsies are scheduled for Tuesday in Saint John, about 475 kilometres to the south.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Reptile Ocean took down its Facebook page Monday afternoon after vitriolic criticism appeared targeting its administrators, none of whom responded to the Star’s requests for comment.

“There is nobody to blame. The snake broke out of its enclosure. The enclosure locked. There was no negligence. This is a terrible accident,” read one of Reptile Ocean’s posts.

The site later published a short statement extending its deepest sympathies to the children’s family and called the deaths “a terrible accident without a meaning.”

Read more about: