The killings of two adults at a school and two teenage brothers at a residence have left residents shattered, the mayor of La Loche, a small town in northern Saskatchewan, said Saturday.
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A man holds a rosary as police investigate the scene of a shooting… A 17-year-old has been charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder.
Norma Janvier, a community co-ordinator at the school and colleague of Marie but not a close relative, said: “I’m still in a little bit of shock”. Students, just returning from lunch, flee for their lives. “Everybody knew her; everybody loved her”.
The 35-year-old started his teaching career in September in La Loche. “When we were out and about kids would say ‘Hi.’ They would just come running to her. And she was just a friend to everybody”. They were just yelling to me. “I’m just so sad”, he said. “I loved her, I really did”, said Park, who remembered her smile and how she would blush when she was happy.
There have been many mass shootings at American schools in recent years, most notably one at Columbine high school Colorado that killed in 12 students and a teacher in 1999 and one at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., that killed 20 children and 6 staff in 2012.
“Every individual in La Loche has been wounded by this event”, acting Mayor Kevin Janvier said at a press conference.
A solemn Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had said earlier from Davos, Switzerland, that five people were dead and two critically injured in the remote Dene community. “And then I was hearing those shots, too, so of course I started running”. Noel Desjarlais-Thomas, 16, sent local media a screenshot of the exchange between the suspected gunman and several friends.
Residents say shots were fired at both a home and the school and RCMP confirmed their investigation involves the two locations.
Highschool teacher Adam Wood from Uxbridge, Ont. was also one the victims killed at the school on Friday. Some said they ran for the doors when they saw a shotgun, while others hid in gym dressing rooms for hours.
Wall promised that necessary crisis support and counselling services would be provided to the school and the community. La Loche, like a number of aboriginal communities in Canada’s prairie provinces, has been plagued by high suicide rates and poverty. Bobby Cameron, Chief of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations, said the shooting Friday was the worst tragedy to ever hit the community of 3,000. “While the lockdown was happening, you could just hear all these gunshots getting closer, [then] getting distant”.
The area’s representative in parliament, who attended the same school, was setting up a constituency office in the community when the shooting occurred.
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Marie Janvier, 23, was one of four victims of a shooting spree in La Loche, Sask. Sandy Herman, a longtime acquaintance of Janvier, above, identified her in this photo..
