Six people, including a 73-year-old suspect, died and one person was wounded in a shooting at a residential building in the Canadian city of Vaughan on Sunday in an incident the city’s mayor described as horrifying and shocking.
Police were called about an “active male shooter who had shot several victims” at a condominium in Vaughan, less than 50 km (31 miles) north of downtown Toronto, at about 7:20 p.m. local time on Sunday (0020 GMT on Monday).
Police found and fired at the suspect in a hallway and he was pronounced dead about 40 minutes later, a spokesperson for Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) told reporters on Monday.
Authorities then recovered dead bodies from several floors as well as a semi-automatic handgun that is suspected to be the weapon used in the shooting, SIU spokesperson Kristy Denette said.
Canada has much stricter gun laws than the United States, but Canadians are allowed to own firearms providing they have a licence. Restricted or prohibited firearms, like handguns, must also be registered.
Denette said the suspect had been identified as a resident of the building but his next of kin had not consented to releasing his name. No information was shared about any potential motive.
The York Regional Police Department said it was working to confirm the identities of the victims and inform their families. Vaughan is located in Ontario’s York region and has a population of about 320,000.
“Everybody is horrified … to wake up to this news this morning, to hear it last night. People are just in absolute shock,” Vaughan Mayor Steven Del Duca said on Monday. The wounded person was recovering at a hospital, he said.
The SIU, which investigates deaths involving police, said it was looking into the suspect’s death and that a post-mortem was scheduled for Tuesday.
Canada’s gun homicide rate is a fraction of the United States’ rate, 2020 data showed, but is still higher than other wealthy countries and has been rising, with handguns the main weapon used in the majority of firearm-related violent crimes between 2009 and 2020.
Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government has been trying to tackle gun violence through a slew of measures including a ban on the sale, purchase or transfer of handguns that took effect in October.
“To the families and friends of the victims of yesterday’s shooting in Vaughan: I’m keeping you in my thoughts,” Trudeau said on Twitter.
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