Peel police say they have charged a 28-year-old Brampton man with attempted murder and aggravated assault after a five-year-old child who went missing Thursday morning was found with critical injuries.

The child was reported missing by his mother on Thursday morning. Police said she saw him in his room at around 2 a.m. When she woke up at around 6 a.m., police said, the child was gone and the front door of the house, in the area of McHardy Court and McMurchy Avenue, was open.

The boy was located by Peel Regional Police’s canine unit shortly before 7 a.m. Police said the child was found unconscious and showing “signs of physical trauma.”

"Once we got the phone call our officers flooded the area and that included uniform patrol and canine officers. At around 6:59 this morning the missing boy was located near some rail tracks not too far from his residence," Const. Harinder Sohi told CP24 Thursday morning.

"He does have some injuries. We did call paramedics and he is being transported to a hospital.”

Paramedics confirmed that the boy was initially taken to Brampton Civic Hospital for treatment but is now being transported to Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto.

The child, paramedics added, sustained head injuries.

At a news conference Thursday afternoon, Const. Sarah Patten said the child was in stable, but life-threatening condition.

She added that the suspect was known to the family and had a previous criminal history.

Kerry McInnis, a friend of the child’s mother, confirmed that the suspect was a former boyfriend of the five-year-old’s mother.

“No one wanted him around,” McInnis said. “He was lingering, mooching.”

According to McInnis, the suspect had been staying with the mother recently.

“She was just trying to help a friend out,” she said.

Officers say there was no sign of forced entry at the home.

“Here at the scene we’ve got our investigators and they are doing their very best. They have started canvassing. We want every possible video feed, any information that is coming in from anybody who may have seen or heard anything,” Peel Police Const. Danny Marttini said.

Patten said it is still not known where the alleged assault occurred, if it happened at the home or on the way to the train tracks.

“This is a huge investigation,” she said at the news conference. “We will get to the bottom of this.”

“It is completely unacceptable that this happened to a five-year-old child,” Patten added.

The railway tracks have been shut down while police investigate.

“Until we know exactly what we are dealing with, we have to treat it with due care,” she said.

“To my knowledge there wasn’t a train that came through until we entered in so hopefully if there is any evidence, we will get every piece of it.”

Marttini said she does not believe the child has gone missing before.

She noted that the parents are understandably “distressed” by the ordeal.

“I heard the crying and the sobs when I originally talked to the officers,” she said. “I could hear through the phone.”

A suspect is been identified as Dyon Smart. He was taken into custody on Thursday and charged with attempted murder, aggravated assault, failing to comply with recognizance and breach of probation order.

Smart appeared at the Ontario Court of Justice, in Brampton, for a bail hearing Thursday.