Canadian police have identified the person who carried out a school massacre as an 18-year-old woman with mental health issues.
The killer, who police named as Jesse Van Rootselaar, killed herself after the shooting on Tuesday, local time, in Tumbler Ridge, a remote community in the Pacific province of British Columbia.
Police revised the death toll down to nine from the initially reported 10, including the shooter.
“We have a history of police attendance at the family residence. Some of those calls are related to mental health issues,” Deputy Commissioner Dwayne McDonald, commander of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in British Columbia, told a press conference.
The victims at the school included a 39-year-old teacher, three 12-year-old female students and two male students aged 12 and 13.
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Mr McDonald said Van Rootselaar, who was born male but began to identify as a female six years ago, had first killed her mother, 39, and 11-year-old step-brother at the family home.
“We do believe the suspect acted alone … it would be too early to speculate on motive,” Mr McDonald said.
Earlier in the day, a visibly upset Prime Minister Mark Carney promised Canadians would get through what he called a “terrible” shooting.
The Canadian PM has ordered flags on all government buildings be flown at half-mast for the next seven days. (Reuters: Jennifer Gauthier)
Mr Carney, who has postponed a trip to Europe, said he had ordered flags on all government buildings be flown at half-mast for the next seven days.
“We will get through this. We will learn from this,” he told reporters, at one point looking close to tears.
“But right now, it’s a time to come together, as Canadians always do in these situations, these terrible situations, to support each other, to mourn together and to grow together.”
What we know about the mass shooting
Shooting ranks among deadliest
The shooting ranks among the deadliest in Canadian history. Canada has stricter gun laws than the United States, but Canadians can own firearms with a licence.
In April 2020, a 51-year-old man disguised in a police uniform and driving a fake police car shot and killed 22 people in a 13-hour rampage in the Atlantic province of Nova Scotia, before police killed him at a gas station.
In Canada’s worst school shooting, in December 1989, a gunman killed 14 female students and wounded 13 at the Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal, Quebec, before committing suicide.
“There’s not a word in the English language that’s strong enough to describe the level of devastation that this community has experienced,” said Larry Neufeld, a local provincial legislator.
ABC/Reuters