© Marc Grandmaison/Associated Press A police roadblock in Moncton, New Brunswick, where a gunman killed three Canadian mounted police and wounded two others.
A gunman has shot dead three Canadian mounted police and injured two more in one of the worst losses of life for the country's police forces in a decade.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police in New Brunswick said on their Twitter feed that they were in pursuit of 24-year-old Justin Bourque of Moncton who was considered armed and dangerous. The police force tweeted an image of a suspect wearing military camouflage and carrying two guns.
#Codiac #RCMPNB - 3 officers mortally wounded by shooter. 2 officers sustained non life threatning injuries. Shooter still actively sought.RCMP spokesman Paul Greene said the two wounded RCMP officers had non-life-threatening injuries. The Horizon Health Network, a provincial health authority, said on its Twitter feed that two patients were taken to the Moncton hospital with gunshot wounds.
- RCMP New Brunswick (@RCMPNB) June 5, 2014
Constable Damien Theriault said police were urging people in a certain area of Moncton, New Brunswick, to stay inside.
He said the search for the suspect was concentrated around two streets.
Sean Gallacher, who lives near the area where police were concentrating their search, said he heard what he now believed were gunshots. "I was downstairs and heard a few bangs," said Gallacher, 35.
Four Canadian RCMP officers, known as "mounties", were killed in March 2005 by a gunman on a farm in the province of Alberta. It was the RCMP's worst single-day loss of life in more than 100 years.
Reader Comments
I recognise that this is a tragedy for the families involved to lose a loved one to an act of violence.
I very rarely watch TV events. but talking with my acquaintance and hearing her reaction to the event (she was in tears at one point) made me wonder. What if this was a false flag event, yes I know sounds like conspiracy theory. Guess I have good company since a large portion of society thinks that such events are possible.
The mass outpouring of grief, when looking at the media coverage on the web it reminded me of something akin to a state funeral of royalty, political leaders or others of that ilk.
This is some of the coverage in the mass media
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There is this strange report profiling the alleged killer calling him a 'Pseudo Commando with anti government Freeman Ideology' whatever that is supposed to mean. Strange I couldn`t find any pictures of the alleged killer in custody.
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Makes me also wonder about the use of mass media in the form of live media to inculcate The Crowd philosophy
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The disappearance of conscious personality and the turning of feelings and thoughts in a definite direction, which are the primary characteristics of a crowd about to become organised, do not always involve the simultaneous presence of a number of individuals on one spot. Thousands of isolated individuals may acquire at certain moments, and under the influence of certain violent emotions—such, for example, as a great national event—the characteristics of a psychological crowd. It will be sufficient in that case that a mere chance should bring them together for their acts to at once assume the characteristics peculiar to the acts of a crowd. At certain moments half a dozen men might constitute a psychological crowd, which may not happen in the case of hundreds of men gathered together by accident. On the other hand, an entire nation, though there may be no visible agglomeration, may become a crowd under the action of certain influences.
One may ask what is the purpose, one could speculate, gun control, to portray the police as a protector of the people and to incite trust in there authority.
The allegory of the Sword of Damocles runs through my mind.