Winnipeg police boost presence after shootings
CBC News | Posted: October 25, 2010 4:56 PM | Last Updated: October 26, 2010
Victims ID'd as Tommy Beardy, 35, and Ian MacDonald, 52
Winnipeg police are setting up a mobile command unit in the city's North End, flooding the area with foot and vehicle patrols and releasing descriptions of suspects following weekend shootings that left two men dead and a teen girl critically injured.
Police Chief Keith McCaskill said the force is putting all available resources into the investigation to find the individual or people responsible.
Suspects sought
On Monday, police issued descriptions of suspects for each of the three shootings on three different streets.
Stella Walk: An aboriginal male in his late teens or early 20s who is about six feet tall with a skinny build. He was wearing dark clothing and riding a dark-coloured mountain bike.
Dufferin Avenue: A person of unknown gender who was wearing dark clothing.
Boyd Avenue: An aboriginal man about five feet eight inches tall who was wearing dark clothing. Police said he might have been accompanied by a female.
Investigators ask anyone with information to call police at 204-986-6508 or Crime Stoppers at 1-204-786-TIPS (8477)
"The most important thing here is to make sure that we get that information that is going to be helpful to solve this awful crime," he said.
There are no new leads, McCaskill said.
He could not say whether one or more people are believed to be responsible or if the shootings are linked.
However, officers are working around the clock to get those answers, he said, adding he wants to send a message to the community — and whoever pulled the triggers — that police won't rest until arrests are made.
Girl's condition improves
McCaskill spoke to media at the Indian and Métis Friendship Centre, about a block from where the 13-year-old girl was shot Saturday night. She was was hit in the abdomen while walking with friends in the 200 block of Stella Walk. Her medical condition was upgraded Monday to stable.
Two other shootings followed soon after — outside a home in the 400 block of Dufferin Avenue, then outside a home in the 400 block of Boyd Avenue.
A man was killed in each of those incidents: family members and friends of the victims said Tommy Beardy, 35, was killed on Dufferin and Ian Layton MacDonald, 52, died in the Boyd shooting.
Beardy was a relative of the Grand Chief of Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, an agency representing most First Nations communities in Manitoba's north. David Harper said Beardy was his cousin's son and described him as a good man with a good family.
Harper challenged those responsible for the slayings to come forward.
"We are calling on whoever has caused this to bring himself in and make sure we deal with this accordingly. I mean, right now, [the suspect's] not in a good position where he's at now," he said.
MacDonald hailed from a small town near Cape Breton, N.S., and was in Winnipeg to care for a disabled relative, said friend Lorne Edwards.
Province pledges support
The shootings, which took place just blocks apart, between 8:40 p.m. and 9:15 p.m., appear to have been random events and that the victims weren't targeted, police said.
Manitoba Justice Minister Andrew Swan called the weekend shootings senseless and tragic, and said the province is willing to assist police in any way it can to end the violence in the North End.
"If there are additional resources, if there is going to be overtime, if there's going to be additional things the police believe they need to do, I want to make the chief very, very aware that the province stands with our police service," Swan said.