The suspect made a brief preliminary court appearance via video link on Sunday afternoon
Quebec:
The sword-armed attacker dressed in medieval costume who killed two people and injured five others in a Halloween rampage in Quebec City was “not associated with a terrorist group,” said Sunday Canadian police.
The attacks occurred Saturday evening in several places in the Old Quebec district, near the tourist hotspot of Château Frontenac and the National Assembly, the provincial parliament of Quebec.
The suspect, who was arrested early Sunday after a street-by-street manhunt lasting several hours, has been identified by local media as Carl Girouard, a man with a history of mental health issues in a Montreal suburb . Police have yet to confirm his identity.
A police spokesperson said the attack appeared premeditated – the suspect had spoken of committing such a crime five years ago – but added he had no criminal record.
The suspect made a brief preliminary court appearance via video link on Sunday afternoon; he was told he would face two homicide charges and five others for attempted homicide.
A search was carried out at his home in Sainte-Thérèse, near Montreal, local media also reported.
“Yesterday evening, we were plunged into a night of horror when a 24-year-old man, who does not live in Quebec, came with the intention of causing as many victims as possible,” the chief told reporters. of the Quebec police, Robert Pigeon.
He said the suspect was armed with a Katana sword, a curved saber of the type once used by samurai warriors in Japan.
“Everything leads us to believe that he chose his victims at random,” Pigeon added.
A police spokesperson identified the two people killed as François Duchesne, 56, and Suzanne Clermont, 61. Four men, aged 19 to 67, were injured, along with a 24-year-old woman.
The police chief said two of the victims are longtime French residents of Quebec.
Some of the injured suffered “severe lacerations,” he said.
Anne Pasquier, a hairdresser next to one of the killed, Clermont, said the woman did not have time to cross the street on Saturday evening “because the suspect had arrived just a second and beheaded her”, a detail that has not yet been confirmed by officials.
“She was adorable. She had a great sense of humor,” added Jean-Pierre Ajmo, 82, a personal friend.
The other fatal victim, Duchesne, was responsible for communications at the Musée des beaux-arts du Québec, according to Jean Rousseau, city councilor.
– “ Barbarian ” stab wounds –
“My heart breaks for the loved ones of the two people killed in last night’s horrific attack in Quebec City,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Twitter. “I also wish a full recovery to the injured.”
“All of Quebec is in mourning,” declared the Deputy Premier of Quebec, Geneviève Guilbault, who denounced the “barbaric” acts.
According to three witnesses quoted by the Quebec newspaper Le Soleil, the attacker would have “slit the throat” of his first victim near the Château Frontenac hotel, and there was “a lot of blood”.
The man then continued rue des Remparts, where the second person was killed, before heading towards the Old Port, injuring the other victims, according to the newspaper.
Karin Lacoste, a resident of Quebec, said she was walking to a convenience store around 11:00 p.m. when she saw several armed police officers wearing bulletproof vests.
“There was one who said to me: ‘Run to your place because there is someone walking around, he is a killer and he has killed people” “, she said. to the LCN news channel. “I was very afraid.”
Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the streets of Old Quebec were quiet at the time of the attacks.
The mayor of Quebec, Régis Labeaume, called the incident “terrifying”, but insisted that the city is “one of the safest in the world“.
“It is difficult, if not impossible, to anticipate the consequences of insanity that clearly stem from mental health issues,” he added.
(Except for the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is posted from a syndicated feed.)
