Familiarity does breed a sense of safety that may not necessarily be warranted by circumstances. Yet the owner of Reptile Ocean in Campbellton, New Brunswick, operated evidently within the law, took additional precautions to ensure security by double-locking the cages of the reptiles in his possession and somehow, mysteriously, an African rock python whose girth measured between 3-1/2 and 4-1/2 metres long, weighing roughly 45 kilograms - the low-end of human weight - managed to free itself during the night from its double-locked cage.

Above the store was a private apartment where the reptile-shop owner, Jean-Claude Savoie lived with his young son. That evening Mr. Savoie's son had two sleep-over guests, ages 5 and 7. The two young boys' mother is a close friend of Mr. Savoie, lives next door, and is employed at Reptile Ocean, the shop owned by Mr. Savoie.

"I thought they were sleeping until I (saw) the hole in the ceiling. I turned the lights on and I (saw) this horrific scene. (The snake) went through a ventilation system. I don't understand how it did it." Mr. Savoie found the snake and secured it in a cage.

"(The snake) had escaped its enclosure at the store sometime through the night, got into the ventilation system and into the upstairs apartment. It's believed the two boys were strangled by the snake", said RCMP Constable Julie Rogers-Marsh.

This type of snake kills victims by constricting them; slowly squeezing them to death. Autopsies are to be performed on the two little boys. According to the town's deputy mayor the facility was licensed to operate and "everything was according to our bylaws to the provincial guidelines."

And isn't that an enormous relief.

This picture taken on February 10, 2013 shows a python shown during a snake display at the National Zoo in Kuala Lumpur. An escaped python killed two children in their sleep in eastern Canada, police said on August 6, 2013. The two young boys, aged five and seven, were sleeping at a friend's apartment late Sunday in the small town of Campbellton when they were surprised by the snake. AFP PHOTO / MOHD RASFANMOHD RASFAN/AFP/Getty Images