Police in Toronto, Canada, said on Thursday afternoon (26) that they shot and wounded a man suspected of walking through a school district with a gun.
The corporation said in Twitter posts that the man, in his 20s, was carrying a rifle. Until the publication of this text, there was no further information about the man’s health status or whether the police already had details of what his intentions were.
An emergency team was called to the scene, and police said there was no longer a risk to public safety.
At least four schools are close to the region where the incident took place. All were closed at the time of pursuit of the suspect, and two have already been released.
The case is notable for having occurred two days after the attack at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, South Texas. At the time, Salvador Ramos, 18, entered the institution and shot dead 19 children and 2 adults, the worst massacre in a children’s educational institution in the US in almost ten years.
President Joe Biden used the case to, in an emotional speech, return to criticizing the pro-gun lobby in the country and defending control on access to weapons.
The shooter, according to people close to the American press, had a adolescence marked by bullying and family problems. Also at school, he got into fights — there are records of at least five occasions when he exchanged punches with classmates.
He made no secret of his desire to gain access to heavier weaponry. A year ago, he posted pictures of automatic rifles, capable of firing bursts of shots, and said they were on his wish list.
The attack took place ten days after another similar action. On May 14, an 18-year-old man killed ten black people in the city of Buffalo, New York. The gunman, Payton Gendron, opened fire on supermarket customers, in an action broadcast live on the internet – an environment in which he also published a manifesto to justify the attack, based on racist theories, such as that blacks were taking the place of whites in society.
