Tumbler Ridge shooter identified as 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar
The alleged suspect behind the mass shooting in a remote Canadian town has been identified.
Jesse Van Rootselaar has been named as the alleged shooter in Tumbler Ridge in British Columbia, Canada.
Van Rootselaar was identified as the shooter by Royal Canadian Mounted Police Deputy commissioner Dwayne McDonald on Wednesday.
Six people were shot dead in Tumbler Ridge secondary school and one person died on the way to the hospital.
Two more people were found dead inside a home in the ‘close-knit’ town, while at least 25 people were injured in the rampage.
McDonald said that the two people found dead were Van Rootselaar’s mother, and Van Rootselaar’s step-brother, he says.
McDonald says the police ‘don’t have an idea yet’ as to what the suspect’s motive was, but they were ‘passionately pursuing’ one.
He added in a press conference that the 18-year-old suspect was ‘born as a biological male, who…. approximately six years ago began to transition to female, and identified as female’.
McDonald says police have identified the suspect as ‘they chose to be identified.’
‘I can say that Jesse was born as a biological male who approximately six years ago began to transition to female’, he said.
Van Rootselaar ‘identified as female, both socially and publicly’, he said before adding her family home had been visited for mental health checks.
Victims of the shooting
A police official then gives an update on the deceased. In the school they are:
- A 39-year-old female educator
- Three female students, all aged 12
- Two male students, one aged 12 and the other 13
The deceased in the residence are:
An 11-year-old boy, the step-brother of the suspect
One 39-year-old female, the mother of the suspect
Police first received a report of an active shooter at 1.20pm local time (9.20pm in the UK).
Pupils in the close-knit school described how they barricaded themselves inside their classrooms for two hours during what has become one of the deadliest school shootings in the country’s history.
Around 100 students and staff were evacuated from the school after officers arrived at the scene.
One of the first victims of the mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, Canada, has been identified as a 12-year-old girl who is fighting for her life in the hospital.
Maya Edmonds, 12, was shot in the neck and head while attending Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.
A fundraiser has been set up to help support Maya through her recovery, with her mum writing: ‘I’m writing this post sitting in Vancouver Children’s hospital while my daughter fights for her life.
‘Today started as any other. Now, however, my 12-year-old daughter is fighting for her life while they try to repair the damage from a gunshot wound to the head. And one to the neck.
‘She was a lucky one, I suppose. Condolences to the other families during this tragedy. This doesn’t even feel real.’
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