A New Canadian Concern : Troubled Teens Plotting School Atrocities

"I feel like we're losing that connection of community and kids in the day of the internet, where sometimes the internet is the parent. And so, if there's anything that comes out of this and the incidents of 2026, I hope it is a willingness to have a very serious conversation about that."

"Before Tumbler Ridge, we may [have said], 'Were they actually going to do it?'  And now, we don't have the luxury of that thought process any more. To me, that is a heart-breaking state that our country is in, that has to be our state of mind now."

"In the past, we've been a little naive as a society and thought, 'Oh, you know, kids'. Or maybe just dismissed things when we should have taken them a little bit more seriously. And I think those days are gone now."

"Only the two students know if they were actually going to follow through, and I think that's what we really need to know. That's what our community wants to know and I'm sure in Manitoba they're thinking the same thing. They want to know: 'Were you going to really do this and why?'"

Mayor David Mitchell, Bridgewater, Nova Scotia

 

"[Rivers residents are] still processing [and dealing with the shock]."

"[It's] the world that we live in. It's very different now. There's a lot of hate and emotions that people don't know how to deal with."

"I've always kind of thought the internet somehow makes it worse. But then now the internet was a blessing to us that they could solve a problem before it really happened."

Mayor Heather Lamb, Riverdale Municipality, Rivers, Manitoba

 

"[The Rivers teen] was actively discussing and planning to harm other students at the Rivers Collegiate."

"Police located detailed handwritten plans, imitation weapons, roughly made imitation pipe bomb and assault rifle, electronic devices including cellphone and laptop and clothing with hate symbols and concerning comments."

Cpl. Melanie Roussel, Manitoba RCMP 

Bridgewater police arrested the 15-year-old on Tuesday. (Gareth Hampshire/CBC

In Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia a scant few months ago, an 18-year-old transgender youth went on a gun rampage through a school he had once attended. For the previous several years, the youth identified as female. When he entered the Tumbler Ridge school he was dressed as a woman, and was referred to after arrest for murder as 'she'. Before entering the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, the killer had turned his attention to his mother and a younger half-brother. After shooting them to death, he went on to the school to kill another six people, five students and a teacher, before he was finally stopped.

 

Now, two teens, one in Nova Scotia, the second in Manitoba, have been revealed to have discussed between them over the internet a similar plot to kill. They never advanced to the final stages of their scheme, however. They were arrested in mid-March. It seems that a 15-year-old girl who attended Parkview Education Centre in Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, in online contact with a 14-year-old boy at Rivers Collegiate in Rivers, Manitoba had plotted to attack their schools with a view to killing other students.

 

Park View Education Centre is located in Bridgewater, N.S. It is a public senior high school that has about 900 students. (Cris Monetta/CBC)

 

Bridgewater Mayor David Mitchell spoke of children with mental health problems, compounded by malign influences they find on the internet, and that in his opinion there is an imperative at the national level for a conversation about these issues afflicting youth in Canadian communities, while emphasizing the importance at the present time of allowing the justice system to make its determination with respect to the two teens. 

 

The 15-year-old girl from Bridgewater, Nova Scotia was charged with conspiracy to murder and uttering death threats. Police noted that "hate crime and other possible offences are currently under investigation". As for the 14-year-old boy in Manitoba, he has been charged with uttering threats. The RCMP in Manitoba stated that additional charges may be forthcoming at the conclusion of their investigation. 

 

A 15-year-old from Nova Scotia and a 14-year-old from Manitoba are facing charges after police allege they planned simultaneous attacks at their schools in Bridgewater, N.S., and Rivers, Man. Police say they were alerted by the FBI and Interpol about online conversations between two teens.   CBC

 

It was revealed back in February that tech giant OpenAI had disclosed to police that the ChatGPT account of the mass shooter with eight deaths on his head, had been disabled in June. "Violent activity" on his account alerted the tech company's program investigators to the content of the account which they transmitted to the company's legal department for the potential of violent criminal intent. The legal department in turn had advised their head office administration to contact police, but those making the final decisions decided not to.  

"You put little hints out and hope that people are going to pick  up those hints. Sometimes the seeding is so that it does get thwarted and you do get attention and intervention. So, it's like a cry for  help."

"A lot of times people have nobody in their life. They don't belong to a group and the need to belong is such a fundamental human motivator that they find people who have similar ideology, or maybe sometimes they come into these groups without holding that ideology but wanting to belong to a group. We always do that-- we adapt to the group's norms. And the group norms here are nefarious and problematic. So, it doesn't surprise me that we see this from Nova Scotia to Manitoba."

"It was missed with Tumbler Ridge -- a huge miss. Tumbler Ridge was a large mistake."

"In about a third of the cases, there is a bully. There's a real interest in guns, violence and prior school shootings. So, they become a little bit obsessed and become experts in this type of violence."

"It's almost like a bravado; it's almost like a need to belong. You sh-t talk, then you're part of this disenfranchised group. But at least, you're part of the group, and that happens a lot."

Criminologist Tracy Vaillancourt, Canada Research Chair in Youth Mental Health and Violence Prevention, University of Ottawa