Boy, 5, shot in head after Indy race
Three suspects arrested
Scott Stinson
National Post, with files from The Gazette
Monday, July 14, 2003
TORONTO -- A five-year-old boy was in hospital last night with a BB pellet lodged in his brain after a suspected shooting spree while thousands of people walked waterfront-area streets after the Molson Indy.
City police said that the boy, who was not identified, is in critical condition and faces life-threatening surgery after the pellet entered his brain through his eye socket.
Another male victim might also require surgery after being shot in the arm, and investigators believe several more people might have been randomly shot by three young men with pellet guns.
Police said three suspects are under arrest and two weapons have been recovered. The suspects, reportedly arrested as their car was stuck in traffic, were not identified.
"We have some idea as to what has gone on here," said Staff Sergeant Ralph Brookes of 14 Division.
"We're pretty sure there were more people who were hurt, so we are issuing an appeal to the public for people to come forward and tell us what they know," Staff Sgt. Brookes said.
The boy and his mother were standing at a bus stop at the corner of Bathurst Street and Lakeshore Boulevard shortly after 5 p.m. when he was struck by a single pellet. His mother was not hurt. Crowds of people were outside in the hours after the Molson Indy CART series automobile race.
Witnesses reported blood gushing from the victim's eye, and a nearby ambulance rushed the boy to the Hospital for Sick Children.
"The victim is currently facing life-threatening surgery," Staff Sgt. Brookes said. "He is at the best hospital in the world and he will get the best possible care, but that's all we have to go on at the moment with an injury like this."
The second victim, a young man who was not identified, was being treated at Toronto Western Hospital last night for a wound in his arm.
Staff Sgt. Brookes said the pellet had not been removed from the victim's arm, and that surgery was a possibility.
Pellet guns, usually powered by compressed carbon dioxide, resemble handguns and rifles but fire metal pellets instead of bullets.
Although they are not considered firearms and as such are not subject to the regulations of the Firearms Act, safety advocates have long maintained pellet guns should be classified lethal weapons. Instead, there is no requirement in Canada to have a licence or registration for the guns.
Gaby Costa, a Montreal-area gun merchant, told a Montreal newspaper last month after several people were shot by a pellet gun that the weapons can kill at close range.
"If you put these next to your heart and you let it go, it will go right through your heart," Mr. Costa said. "That is how powerful they are. It can really hurt somebody."
If a pellet gun is used in the commission of an offence or to cause injury, charges can be laid under the Criminal Code, police said.
The investigation continues.
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