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<\/p>\n\u201cThis was a very active and chaotic scene,\u201d Barredo said. \u201cAt times, there was some concern of an active shooter. That turned out not to be the case.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t<\/p>\n
The mayor said she was very disturbed by the deadly gunfire and offered her condolences to the victims and their families.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m deeply angry about this reckless, irresponsible act of violence in the middle of a festival attended by families, children, seniors,\u201d Chow said. <\/p>\n
Festivalgoers described a chaotic scene after shots were fired, with people running and screaming as police converged on the area of St. Clair Avenue West and Arlington Avenue.<\/p>\n
Valerie Rodriguez said she was sitting next to a restaurant when she saw people fleeing.<\/p>\n
\u201cA bunch of people \u2026 told us to lay down onto the floor,\u201d she said. \u201cWe got scared because we didn\u2019t know exactly what was happening.\u201d<\/p>\n
Patsy Gutierrez, a vendor at the festival, said she was serving customers when she saw \u201ca huge wave\u201d of people running.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody started getting frantic, and then we stopped serving,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t think it should be something that\u2019s happening in these type of events.\u201d<\/p>\n
William Ajselett said he was in line to buy food when he witnessed \u201ca crowd-crushing situation.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the crowd dispersed, he said he tracked down his wife and made sure his friends were okay.<\/p>\n
Josh Matlow, a city councillor in the area, said he was at the festival earlier in the day and it was \u201cvery peaceful.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe vibe was great,\u201d he said at the scene.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came over to support the police efforts and, of course, to be in touch with community leaders who are scared and worried about the neighbourhood.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ontario Premier Doug Ford and Prime Minister Mark Carney both said they were horrified by the shooting. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy prayers are with the families grieving their loved ones, those who are in critical condition, and everyone who has been affected by this horrific event,\u201d Carney said in a social media post.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy thanks to the police officers and other first responders whose courage and fast action prevented further tragedy. Police have my full support as they work to apprehend the perpetrators and bring them to justice.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ford said he is devastated by the \u201csenseless\u201d violence, adding that \u201cthe person responsible must be caught, brought to justice and spend the rest of their life behind bars.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Salsa on St. Clair festival has been running for more than 20 years and features live music performances and dancing over two days. It\u2019s one of the biggest events on Toronto\u2019s summer calendar.<\/p>\n
Hours after the shooting on Saturday night, festival streets were empty, with only litter, broken glass and police vehicles remaining.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Kathryn Mannie, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThis was a very active and chaotic scene,\u201d Barredo said. \u201cAt times, there was some concern of an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":796486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194291],"tags":[879,49,48,2467,2461,2468,2460,2462,2463,44,2464,2465,2466,82,3302],"class_list":["post-796833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto","tag-breaking-news","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-central-vancouver-island","tag-nanaimo","tag-nanaimo-breaking-news","tag-nanaimo-news","tag-nanaimo-news-now","tag-nanaimonewsnow","tag-news","tag-oceanside","tag-parksville","tag-qualicum","tag-sports","tag-toronto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=796833"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796833\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/796486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=796833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=796833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=796833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}