Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told grieving residents of Tumbler Bridge, British Columbia, on Friday that Canadians “will always be with you” at a vigil to mourn victims of one of the country’s worst mass killings.
GMA News Online reports that Carney, opposition leaders and provincial officials traveled to the remote town in a show of support for residents following Tuesday’s attack, in which a gun-wielding teenager took the lives of eight people before killing herself.
“When you wake up tomorrow and the world feels impossible, know that millions of Canadians are with you,” he said.
Carney, a Liberal, was joined by Conservative chief Pierre Poilievre and leaders of several smaller parties at the candlelight ceremony.
18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar who had suffered a series of mental health problems had killed her mother and stepmother at home before shooting dead a teacher and five young students at her former school in Tumbler Bridge, a settlement of around 2,400 in the Canadian Rockies, according to police.
Van Rootselaar, who police say was born a male but begann identifying as a woman six years ago, then died by suicide.
Van Rootselaar was not targeting anyone specifically at the school, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Deputy Commissioner Dwayne McDonald said. “This suspect was, for lack of a better term, hunting. They were prepared and engaging anybody and everybody they could come in contact with,” he said at a press briefing.
The agency said earlier they had at one point seized guns from the house where Van Rootselaar was living but returned them after the owner, who they did not identify, successfully appealed the decision.
The Canadian coalition for Firearm Rights, a pro-gun lobby group, questioned why weapons had been returned to a house where a person with mental illness was living.
McDonald said the two main weapons used in the attack had not previously been seized by police. He did not address the status of two other firearms that were used in the shooting.
Police named the victims as Abel Mwansa, Ezekiel Schofield, Kylie Smith, Zoey Benoit, and Ticaria Lamoert, as well as teacher Shannda Aviugana-Durand.
