‘Homicide me’: Toronto van attack suspect told police. Here is what else we learn about him

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April 24, 2018 23:10:15

Canadian police are questioning a person suspected of working down dozens of pedestrians, killing 10 folks and injuring 15 others, within the centre of Toronto.

Police said the 25-three hundred and sixty five days-frail used to be arrested 26 minutes after he allegedly drove a white condo van into a crowd within the north stay of town, sending our bodies flying.

Canadian High Minister Justin Trudeau said the deadly attack had not changed the country’s threat stage or security preparations for a G7 summit in Quebec in June, including that Canadians must not are living in fright.

Talking to newshounds outside of parliament, Mr Trudeau said it can perhaps take time earlier than the motives of the attacker had been understood, but all Canadians stood with Toronto within the wake of the attack.

« Obviously all Canadians proceed and can proceed to beget questions about why this came about, » Mr Trudeau said.

« What can also very neatly be in a declare to be the motives on the reduction of it? As used to be indicated closing night by our Public Safety Minister, at the moment, we create not beget any reason to suspect that there might perhaps be any nationwide security ingredient to this attack, but clearly the investigations proceed. »

He also praised Toronto police and first responders, who « faced hazard without hesitation as of late ».

Here is what we learn about the van driver and the procedure the incident unfolded.

Who is he?

Police beget acknowledged the suspect as Alek Minassian. He lives within the northern Toronto suburb of Richmond Hill.

They said Mr Minassian used to be not beforehand identified to them and his motives had been nonetheless unknown.

But Toronto Police Chief Tag Saunders said the motive force’s actions « indisputably seemed deliberate ».

Mr Minassian’s Fb online page will not be accessed thru the social networking set, but a bare-bones model obtainable thru the Cyber web Archive said he attended Seneca College from 2011 to April 2018.

It also said he graduated from Thornlea secondary college in 2011 and listed tool pattern under appropriate abilities.

Dilapidated classmate Shereen Chami said Mr Minassian used to be fragment of a excessive college program, in Toronto’s northern suburbs, for college students with particular wants, which covers finding out and behavioural difficulties as neatly as bodily disabilities. He attended a combination of mainstream and separate classes.

Ms Chami remembers him strolling the halls alongside with his fingers together and his head down, and making meowing noises. She said he used to be not violent.

« He wasn’t a social person, but from what I undergo in tips he used to be fully innocent, » she said.

A September 2013 weblog post said Mr Minassian had began to work at Seneca College’s Centre for Style of Originate Technology.

How did it unfold?

Police are nonetheless piecing together peek accounts and surveillance video attempting to hunt down out precisely what came about.

They said the motive force used to be heading south on Yonge Avenue about 1:30pm on Monday and the streets had been crowded with folks when the white condo van mounted the footpath.

Ali Shaker, who used to be riding reach the van on the time, told Canadian broadcast outlet CP24 the driver seemed as if it can perhaps be moving deliberately thru the crowd at greater than forty eight kilometres per hour.

« He supreme started hitting all people, man. He hit each and each single person on the sidewalk. Anybody in his formula he would hit, » he said.

Video broadcast on several Canadian outlets confirmed police animated the motive force, carrying sad dresses, after officers surrounded him and his condo van several blocks from where the incident came about.

Police said the crime scene used to be complex and the carnage spanned greater than a kilometre.

Mr Minassian seemed as if it can perhaps atomize some invent of gesture on the police with an object in his hand supreme earlier than they ordered him to lie down on the bottom and took him away.

Bystander pictures shown on CBC TV confirmed the suspect veritably pointing an object at a police officer who shouts at him to « receive down ». At one level the suspect demands: « Homicide me ».

The BBC reports the suspect also said he had a gun, however the officer replies: « I create not care. Rating down. »

Mr Minassian used to be then taken away by police.

The officer has been praised for keeping mild throughout the incident, with Mr Saunders telling journalists the officer had performed a « nice job » to be pleased the « circumstance and ambiance » and receive to a « mild resolution », in step with the BBC.

Modified into once it a terrorist attack?

Police beget performed down a possible connection to terrorism, but beget not suggested a possible motive or trigger.

Federal Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Ralph Goodale said the attack did « not seem like linked in any formula to nationwide security ».

« On the foundation of all obtainable data on the sizzling time there would seem like no nationwide security connection to this divulge incident, » he said.

« The events that came about on the avenue on the reduction of us are horrendous but they atomize not seem like linked in any formula to nationwide security, based mostly fully on the facts obtainable at the moment. »

It had been a clear effort with the presence of cupboard ministers from seven major industrial countries in Canada to discuss a range of global components within the bustle-up to the G7 meeting reach Quebec City in June.

And what about Alex Minassian?

He’s a random man who appears to be like to beget been caught up within the initial reaction to the incident thanks to an fashioned misspelling of the suspect’s name.

A quantity of media outlets had been using the name Alex and not Alek and a few even tracked down a social media story they believed belonged to the suspect.

But it absolutely grew to turn out to be out to be the defective man.

« Now not me. No connection. NBC, ABC, CBC, stop harassing my family and associates, » Alex Minassian wrote on his Fb online page.

In accordance with York Set, the mistake grew to turn out to be so in sort that Toronto police had to call Alex Minassian to let him know they had been mindful it wasn’t him.

So what now?

Police said the suspect used to be scheduled to look in court docket at 10:00am on Tuesday (12:00am, Wednesday AEST).

More data on the charges in opposition to him are anticipated to be launched for the time being.

ABC/wires

Matters:

legislation-crime-and-justice,

crime,

assassinate-and-manslaughter,

canada

First posted

April 24, 2018 20:00:21