Police have announced that the killing of a London Ontario Muslim family yesterday was a hate crime. The religious and racial hatred prevalent in Canada raises its ugly head again.
Four members of a Canadian Muslim family who were killed on Sunday when a pickup truck jumped the curb and ran them over were deliberately targeted in an anti-Islamic hate crime, Canadian police said on Monday.
"There is evidence that this was a planned, premeditated act, motivated by hate," Detective Superintendent Paul Waight of the London, Ontario, police told reporters. "It is believed that these victims were targeted because they were Muslim," Waight said.
Police arrested the suspected attacker, 20-year-old Nathaniel Veltman, on Sunday. His truck swerved off the road, over the curb, struck the family and then drove off at high speed, police said, citing witnesses. ...
Veltman, described as a London resident, has been charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder. He is due in back in court on Thursday after being remanded to custody on Monday. Veltman does not have a criminal record, and is not known to be a member of a hate group, police said. He was arrested in a mall parking lot without incident while wearing a body-armor-type vest, police said. There is no evidence he had any accomplices.
The attack was the worst against Canadian Muslims since a man gunned down six members of a Quebec City mosque in 2017. London Mayor Ed Holder said it was the worst mass murder his city had ever seen.
Police said the family requested that the names of the victims not be released yet, but provided their ages. A 74-year-old woman died on the scene, while a 46-year-old man, a 44-year-old woman and a 15-year-old girl died after being taken to a hospital, police said. A 9-year-old boy survived and is in the hospital with serious but not life-threatening injuries.
"This is a terrorist attack on Canadian soil, and should be treated as such," said Mustafa Farooq, head of the National Council of Canadian Muslims. "There are some very, very scared people out there," London's mayor said.
London, which has about 400,000 residents, has a large Muslim community and Holder said Arabic is the second-most-spoken language to English in the city.
https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/four-killed-by-car-were-victims-a...
