Random Stranger Attacks

"Residents in Vancouver are sick of this cap. It's bulls---t."

"[The incident was] devastating. There's a lot of anger actually."

"We can talk about how crime's down, violence, assaults are down, but when these things happen, they're jarring and they really impact the entire community."

"The federal government needs to step up, or at least have a conversation with us.Their responsibility is to help us out because we don’t have the jurisdiction." 

"It isn’t only those in Vancouver who are fed up, but] residents of this entire country."

"The federal government, we need them to come to the table, or just tell the country they’re not serious about this, and they’re going to do nothing about it, and then we’ll deal with it."

"But don’t waste our time and don’t tell people that you’re going to deal with the issue."

Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim

The very Vancouver that is widely recognized as a beautiful city in a geographically spectacular province of mountains, lakes, rivers and forests, is also considered one of best cities of the world to live in. This, despite, the infamous Downtown East Side with its homeless, drug-addicted individuals, the presence of opioid 'harm-reduction clinics' set up to prevent drug overdoses, and the greatest number of deaths from Fentanyl in any Canadian jurisdiction.

Vancouver police officers on the scene outside a 7-Eleven store after police shot and killed a man who injured two people in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, on Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2024. (Ben Nelms/CBC)

Vancouver's problem -- and it's one that plagues most of Canada's large cities -- is random 'stranger' attacks. Random stabbing sprees have become distressingly all too common. It is a symbol of a justice system incapable of protecting the public from the erratic behaviour of violent criminals. On Wednesday one such individual went into an Original Joe's shop located close by the Vancouver Public Library, where he stole a knife and a bottle of liquor. He then went on to stab random strangers in the neighbourhood before being shot fatally by police inside a 7-11.

In January 2022, a man by the name of David Morin repeatedly plunged a knife into a stranger's back at a Vancouver Tim Horton's. Vancouver Police revealed last week that though classified as a "high risk to reoffend", the man had been set free. It all seemed to begin back in 2002 when a 22-year-old Korean student, Ji-Won Park, was attacked in Stanley Park, while he was out jogging. "Stranger attacks" are now a near-daily event. Not all are stabbings, sometimes a push, a shove, a jab, a punch.

Wednesday's attack was one of the more serious events. A predictable pattern of such attacks begin with a mentally unstable offender, one with a criminal record, and often someone with that background, out on bail or probation. Vancouver Police analyzed 44 separate stranger attacks that took place over a three-month period, with the finding that mental health was a factor in 73 percent of cases; 60 percent of suspects had been charged previously with a violent crime.

The problem seems to stem from two sources, one impacting the other; a mental health system unable to keep violent mental health patients from stalking and harming the public. Aligned with a justice system for which bail and early release are routinely granted, even when the most brazen repeat offenders are before them. A random stabbing spree in September saw 70-year-old Francis David Laporte killed, and a man in his 50s mutilated, his hand severed. Both had been strolling the downtown core, then were suddenly victimized by multiple stab wounds.

An erratic and "very troubled" 34-year-old Brendan McBride was arrested. He had been on probation and credited with a lengthy history of court-ordered psychiatric care. "I think that we have to realize that there's too many unwell people walking around in our streets", commented Vancouver Police Chief Adam Palmer. Coast Mental Health called the incident an indictment of the B.C. approach to mental health: "Nothing excuses what's happened here. People want answers. They're not easy solutions", said CEO Kier Macdonald.

An image of the man alleged to have stolen liquor from a bar and wounded two people in downtown Vancouver before being shot and killed by police. CBC News has not yet learned the man's identity. (Submitted to CBC News by a witness)

At the September 2023 Light Up Chinatown festival, the suspect who had stabbed several people randomly, turned out to be a man with a history of stabbing attacks. He was hospitalized, but was given a day pass from a local psychiatric hospital. Charged with three counts of aggravated assault, Blair Donnelly had stabbed his own daughter to death in 2006. Found not criminally responsible for the murder as a result of a mental disorder, Donnelly had been accused since then of stabbing someone while on leave from a mental hospital.

The legal system -- and this is not confined solely to British Columbia -- has proven willing to grant constant release to violent and unpredictable offenders. Leading police forces in British Columbia to refer to a new category of 'super-prolific offenders', defined as an offender with over 30 convictions. Mohammed Majidpour with 30 convictions to his name, in September 2022 randomly attacked a 19-year-old woman in Downtown Vancouver with a pole. Later that same day he set fire to a car. When he was arrested he spent a weekend in detention and then was out on bail.

After which he was arrested several more times. Majidpour was on bail less than three hours before being arrested again for attempting to steal $300-worth of merchandise. Two officers who had arrested Majidpour the previous day on a separate incident, followed him until he broke the law once more. "At the time of his arrest, the suspect had been out of custody for two hours, 18 minutes" a police statement read of the event. 

"If this is a prolific offender, and if the courts will not keep them off our streets, then we should be using the Mental Health Act."

"We need to strengthen the Mental Health Act so that these people who are at risk of harming themselves or others can be held and treated and not be released until they’re no longer a risk."

John Rustad, B.C. Opposition Conservative Leader

Vancouver Police officers responded to a “violent” incident that left multiple people injured Wednesday. (CityNews Image)

 

The Public Relations Value in Islamofascist Terrorism Lunacy

"We are at a terrible loss for words but we must speak out to express our deepest condolences to the families who are now suffering on account of our son's horrific actions. We are utterly devastated by the incomprehensible news that our son was responsible for the senseless violence and loss of life that took place on the Danforth."
"Our son had severe mental health challenges, struggling with psychosis and depression his entire life. The interventions of professionals were unsuccessful. Medications and therapy were unable to treat him. While we did our best to seek  help for him throughout his life of struggle and pain, we could never imagine that this would be his devastating and destructive end."
Hussain family, Toronto

Faisal Hussain, 29, Toronto   Photo provided

"All of a sudden, he just started shooting. It seemed like he wanted to kill as many people as he could. He had this look in his face full of hate -- he was trying to kill people -- like a dog baring his teeth."
"He [Faisal Hussain] went back and finished her [18-year-old Reese Fallon] off. Obviously he wanted to do the most damage, kill as many people as he could. He was walking, stopped just a few steps from the corner, started shooting ... He went back, shot the woman, then started toward the corner, shooting."
Andew Mantzios, Danforth Avenue, Toronto

"They had been shot, so I brought them downstairs, put on some gloves and tried to take care of it [their bloody wounds] as best I could."
"I shut the lights off and locked the doors because I didn't really know what was going on and I didn't know if the person would follow them into where they ran [her tattoo shop ]."
Tanya Wilson, Skin Deep Tattoo studio

"[The gunman] just kept on walking. He ran across the street, and he did it like a first-person shooting game, like a Call of Duty kind of thing, where he just pulled it [handgun] out."
"He was yelling and just, Bam! Bam! He unleashed the whole clip."
"People started scattering, running everywhere."
Nick Balkos, Danforth restaurant

The 18-year-old woman who died in the Toronto Danforth shooting has been identified as Reese Fallon of Toronto. Facebook

Ali Demircan also witnessed the frenetic scrambling of the Sunday night crowds of people ambling along the Danforth, sitting in cafes, going for family outings, meeting with friends at a gentrified urban heart-of-the-city called Greektown, a popular inner-city gathering spot for those living nearby, a place of leisure, relaxation, places to eat and to linger on a summer Sunday evening. He and his friends came across a young woman shot in the arm, as they began fleeing after an initial shooting. "She was so young", he said, describing her confusion and shock.

"I think she was following me", he said later in his witness report after he had suggested she sit on a bench while he called 9-1-1. And then they heard more gunshots and hurriedly began leaving the area. Then he was grazed by a bullet in his back and slumped to the ground, dragging forward in an effort to hide behind parked cars. And then, and then, the police arrived. "I saw that girl who talked with me. She was lying down there and she was bleeding too much", he said of 18-year-old Reese Fallon, who will never become the nurse she planned to attend college for.

The killer took the life of a ten-year-old girl, as well. Two young girls dead, but if he had had his way, shooting methodically and randomly, aiming at people sitting on patios, seated in ice cream parlours, walking along the Danforth and adjoining streets in his wide-ranging rambling, covering ground, visualizing himself Avenging Angel of Death while discarding spent clips, replacing them, shooting again at panicked victims, injuring another 13, until police arrived and shots were exchanged and the terrorist was found dead, prompting a routine investigation to determine whether if he was shot by police, it was justified.

Dreadful, beyond imagination of those who set out innocently for a quiet and pleasant evening on a lovely summer evening. Reese Fallon was with several of her friends. Their futures looking bright before them, their present a bonding time of intimate and trusted friends. How could they ever imagine that death would stalk them on a street they were so comfortably familiar with? Well, the parents of the killer are remorseful that their son was responsible for that carnage. Wasn't that a remarkably erudite, smooth apology, regretful and pained? They suffered a great loss too, didn't they?

In fact, perhaps they hadn't the verbal or written skills to produce such a soulful message of compassionate caring for others. But if they hired a public relations firm a message of that calibre would certainly result. On the other hand, if someone involved in burnishing and covering up the occasionally troubling presence of Islamists amidst Toronto's vast Muslim community would step forward to tell the Hussains to just leave everything to him that would solve their dilemma. So Mohammed Hasim filled their vacuum most professionally, the man a driving force representing the National Council of Canadian Muslims.

So now we know, do we not, that the murder and mayhem was definitely not a thing involving Islam, jihad and terror, it was the construct of a poor man who struggled for equilibrium in his psychological confusion and dreadful burden of mental illness. Canada, where is your patience, Toronto, where your compassion for this poor loner for whom life has always been painful? Victimized by the circumstances of, well, just life, you see. How uncharitable of Tarek Fatah to say it made him feel like 'vomiting' to read and hear Canadian news media discussing gun control issues; no one uttering the word "Islamic" or "terrorism".

Mohammed Hashim was described in a brief biographical sketch at CanRoots 2016, left-wing activist conference thusly: "His groundbreaking political advocacy, public relations and media work has been widely credited by insiders as framing a new narrative for Muslims in Canada. His workshop ‘Progressive organizing in the Muslim communities’ will demonstrate how the GTA Muslim community mobilized in the previous federal election, and laid the groundwork to start building a national political movement."

Police escort civilians away from the scene of a shooting in Toronto’s Greektown neighbourhood. Canadian Press / THE CANADIAN PRESS

As for a man who might have been his protege but whom he is certainly cleaning up after, he was evidently on police radar. "He was fascinated with death and explosions. He also liked replica handguns", said a police source. This man lived with his parents in an apartment. They speak of their son having mental illness but themselves had no knowledge that he owned a firearm and plenty of ammunition and he was very relaxed and familiar with the use of a gun? It would be amusing if it were not so infuriating that Canadian news speak of the "alleged" Danforth attack. 

Canadians are shocked and traumatized. What has been happening in France, Belgium, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Netherlands, the United Kingdom and elsewhere that Muslims have migrated to find a better life for themselves bringing with them their culture, their heritage, their religious devotion, their cleavage in Islamic sectarianism, their hatred of Jews and contempt for infidels, leading to outbreaks of violence attributed to mental breakdowns, is now happening as well in Canada.

Well, Canadians are civilized and patient and understanding. And we understand that Islam cannot be faulted for it is a religion of peace that just incidentally calls its faithful to their duty in jihad. Tarek Fatah testifies to Friday mosque prayers ending in a reminder to Muslims of their duty to despise the infidels and the Jews. This deep-seated pathology of hatred not only corrodes the sensibilities of the fundamentalists but those for whom Islamic ceremonials are no longer sacred; while jihad continues to be, answering the tribal heart of the believer.

Video screenshot of the suspected gunman who opened fire in Toronto’s Greektown. @arilanise/Instagram