A gunman killed two people and seriously injured two others last night as he opened fire in several locations in a Vancouver suburb, including a casino, before being shot dead by police on the morning of July 25th.
Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigate the scene of one of several shootings last night in a quiet suburb near Vancouver, Canada. (Image: Vancouver Sun)The shooter, identified as 28-year-old Jordan Daniel Goggin, lived in nearby Surrey and was known to police but had non-criminal contact, police said in a statement.
We re still investigating to determine if the gunman had acted alone, Chief Superintendent Ghalib Bhayani of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said at a news conference. While the investigation is ongoing, all indications are that there was nobody else involved, and there is no further ongoing threat to public safety.
The six-hour shooting spree began at midnight at the Cascades Casino in Langley, British Columbia, after which a woman was shot and taken to the hospital in critical condition. The shooter killed one person at a nearby homeless center and another at a bus stop.
He was killed by police at 5:45 a.m. while opening fire from a highway overpass after shooting his final victim, a man, in the leg.
Police ResponsePolice sent an emergency cellphone alert to Langley, British Columbia residents at 6:25 a.m., warning them of several shootings āinvolving transient victims.ā However, it is not known if the shooter targeted homeless people or if he knew any of his victims.
We donāt know the motive behind this deadly incident, nor if there was any relationship between the deceased suspect and the victims,ā Bhayani said in a statement.
So far, none of the victims identities have been released.
Langley is a suburb of about 30,000 people about 30 miles southeast of Vancouver. Cascades Casino was opened there in May 2005 by Gateway Casinos.
Canadian Mass Shootings Less CommonMass shootings are less common in Canada than in the US, which has five times Canada s gun homicide rate. However, Canada s gun homicide rate is higher than that of other wealthy countries and has been rising, according to Statistics Canada.
After a gunman killed 14 women and himself in 1989 at Montrealās Ecole Polytechnique engineering college, the country toughened its gun control laws. Since then, possessing an automatic weapon or an unregistered handgun has been illegal. In addition, purchasing a legal weapon now requires criminal background checks, training, risk assessment, two references, and spousal notification.
Still, the deadliest mass shooting in Canadian history happened in 2020. That s when a gunman driving a fake police car shot and killed 13 people in their homes and killed another nine in fires he set across the province of Nova Scotia.
In May, Ottawa introduced legislation to implement a national freeze on the sale and purchase of handguns a week after a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers in their Uvalde, Texas classroom.
