Recent Updates Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 09:51 on 2026-06-24 Permalink | Reply  

    Sadly, news Wednesday is mostly about the man who came to Montreal with a weapon, and not about festivities for Saint‑Jean.

    TVA found a photo of Seth Hatfield and went to the Alberta neighbourhood where the presumed killer lived, and talked to people who knew him, although – perhaps not surprisingly – not to any close friends or family.

    La Presse identifies the police officer who brought the shooter down.

    A lot of pixels have already been spilled trying to psychoanalyze the shooter and define his ideology. Is there any point? We naturally want to understand what drives a person to such an act, but the main reason needs to be an awareness of people with similar attitudes among us, even if we still don’t know how to deprogram them.

     

    • dhomas 10:36 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      There was SOME other news this week. A building collapsed downtown yesterday:
      https://montrealgazette.com/news/building-collapses-downtown-montreal/

    • Kate 10:43 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      I did say “mostly”…! But thanks for the link. I saw a photo on reddit, but hadn’t found the story yet.

    • dhomas 12:37 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      TBH, I’m not sure how a demolition permit was even allowed for that building. Looking at the Google Maps images, it looked like a handsome greystone, apparently built in 1885, that might have been in need of restoration, not demolition.

  • Kate 15:42 on 2026-06-23 Permalink | Reply  

    The Gazette’s Paul Cherry writes about Benoît L’Écuyer, the SPVM officer who was shot dead in 2002 and had been the last SPVM cop killed on duty till Monday’s shooting.

     

    • Ian 16:48 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      I guess there’s no point talking about whatever person the cops mistakenly shot last because it happens way more often

    • Kate 18:46 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      I saw one photo of the hundreds of police who marched in uniform into Notre‑Dame for L’Écuyer’s funeral. We’re not likely to see that for Mohamed Benredouane.

  • Kate 13:19 on 2026-06-23 Permalink | Reply  

    The name of the alleged shooter from Monday has been revealed: Seth Scott Hatfield, a 25‑year‑old from Lethbridge, Alberta, where a search is being carried out Tuesday in a house there. His name also appears on a lengthy manifesto found in a hotel room from which he presumably began shooting.

    (CTV has started autoplaying commercials over their news pages, so be warned.)

     

    • Ian 20:41 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      How is he “alleged”? To say that doesn’t even make sense in l legal terms. He did it, his culpability is up gir discussion technically but the simple fact of the action is clear.

    • qatzelok 20:45 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Someone killed a cop a day after the mayor mentionned how bad the police were to her husband, and now we have an invisible suspect who is also silent.

      Where are the photos of the dead suspect?

    • Kate 22:33 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Ian, the headline to that piece reads “Alleged police shooter identified” – in journalism, until someone is convicted in a court of law, it’s safest to “allege” although I’m not entirely sure this remains necessary when the “alleged” is also dead and thus no trial can take place.

    • Nicholas 23:29 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Tricky here. Shooting is not necessarily a crime; I’ve seen “alleged driver John Doe hits pedestrian”, even when it’s clear he was a driver. Also you can’t live a dead person, so alleged isn’t legally necessary. And as you say, charges can’t ever be laid; civil suits against the estate could be, but that wouldn’t let you say murderer, like OJ. (Though lots of people called him a murderer anyway.)

    • Mark Côté 09:46 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      Guessing this is not going to be labelled as terrorism despite his manifesto’s clear political ideology.

    • Kate 10:01 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      I saw terrorism mentioned at first, but not so much by Wednesday.

      But it’s a question of definition. Is it always terrorism when a heinous act is committed for ideological reasons? Or does terrorism imply that there’s some sort of cause which the assailant feels he is supporting by his actions?

      In a case like Hatfield’s, it feels like he was a solitary person who became fixated on certain ideas and felt there was some logic in carrying out carnage.

      Rebel Media has the entire manifesto and I’ve located it, from curiosity, but not downloaded it nor do I plan to waste time reading it. But people who study psychopathology may end up mining something out of it that clarifies what Hatfield thought he was doing.

      I doubt it will be called terrorism.

    • H. John 12:38 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      Prof. Tandeep Sidhu, U of Manitoba, writes:

      “Ian Lafrenière, Québec’s domestic safety minister, said just hours after the shooting that it wasn’t linked to terrorism.
      This statement is troubling not just because it was made prematurely, in the early stages of the investigation, but also because it contradicted media reporting that outlines the shooter’s grievances in a manifesto linked to the “involuntary celibacy” or “incel” movement. There is growing evidence of an ideological dimension to the shooting.”

      His article:

      The Montréal shooting spotlights the growing public safety threat of online radicalization

      https://tinyurl.com/4zjcbv7m

    • H. John 12:55 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      @Kate asks “Is it always terrorism when a heinous act is committed for ideological reasons?”

      I think it’s still an open question in this case.

      Canadian authorities increasingly treat violent incel ideology as a form of ideologically motivated violent extremism.

      In 2020, the RCMP and federal prosecutors treated the Toronto “Incel Rebellion” machete killing as a terrorism case—the first known Canadian terrorism prosecution based on incel ideology rather than religious or nationalist extremism. The theory was that the attack was motivated by an ideological cause and intended to intimidate or influence a broader population.

  • Kate 09:03 on 2026-06-23 Permalink | Reply  

    Tennis Canada plans a new stadium in Jarry Park, which makes me wonder: isn’t there some other part of town where they could build without claiming more of the green space that’s in such short supply in Villeray‑Park Ex?

    This dream stadium will have a retractable roof. Magic words, those.

     

    • Joey 10:07 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      The baseball field they want to take over is one of the nicer ones in the park – scoreboard, etc., IIRC.

    • SMD 11:07 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Yes, that baseball diamond was renovated under Coderre for hosting the Jeux du Québec. I find it strange that at no point during the seven years of consultation, which led to the City’s Plan Directeur released last summer, Tennis Canada thought it would be pertinent to mention taking over that ballpark for their new stadium. Just zero good faith from these people. And of course, a complete reliance of public funds to pay for it. So that’s a non-public, non-accountable organisation occupying public land and announcing that they are going to take more of it through the media, instead of engaging with the public consultation process, and presuming that the massive costs will be borne by — the public! Talk about gall.

    • Kate 11:10 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      SMD, can you keep me posted about any protests or actions on this?

      Any point in communicating with the borough mayor or councillors, or are they powerless in this matter?

    • Joey 11:32 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Thanks, SMD. I had heard a few years ago that the city was hell-bent on getting rid of the parking lot, which struck me as (a) a bad idea, since LOADs of families rely on it to schlep sports gear, picnic gear, BBQs, etc., to the park, and (b) impossible given the inevitable parking needs of the tennis tournament attendees. I’m guessing that the SMF administration will allow no such thing; you can understand maybe why Tennis Canada would have bypassed a Projet-led consultation and is now ready to make moves under a more ‘aligned’ administration.

    • su 11:37 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      Villeray has over 8,700 people per square kilometer. Because so many apartments house large, multi-generational families without private backyards, the usage of every single square meter of grass in Jarry Park is multiplied.
      A resident in Villeray has less than half the park space of the average Montrealer, and one-tenth of what provincial health guidelines recommend for urban spaces.

    • SMD 13:20 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      @Kate, if you’re not already a Friend of Jarry Park I recommend becoming one. Memberships are free and their newsletter and advocacy are excellent: http://www.capjarry.org. For example, less than two weeks ago they launched a petition to save the pool that already has over 2,500 signatures: http://www.change.org/piscine_du_parc_Jarry. @su is correct that Jarry Park is an essential green space for the crowded residents of Villeray and Park Ex (which has 19,944 people per square kilometer!).

      I wouldn’t discount the pressure on borough officials. As one of the five “Grands Parcs” Jarry Park is planned by the city and maintained by the borough, but if local councillors feel the heat they will pass it on to the Mayor and executive committee. Tennis Canada’s current media strategy is part of high-level negotiations with the City, feds and province, and if there is public pushback these partners will get cold feet (especially in a provincial election year). I think Joey is right about the timing; this never would have gotten past the boardroom in a Plante administration (and we know, because Tennis Canada has floated this trial balloon many times before, basically every year after the tournament).

    • Joey 13:49 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

      @SMD I suspect also that Tennis Canada is worried that the Saputos will succeed in getting Quebec to pony up big dough to reconfigure the inside of the Big O to serve as a semi-permanent home base once the MLS switches to a winter schedule.

      The silver lining for the tennis thing is that the courts are available to regular citizens for fun and practice when the tournament isn’t on, and Canada/Montreal has strong tennis players who would benefit from more and better facilities. Whereas spending hundreds of millions to renovate the interior of the stadium would basically amount to a handout to Joey S., who is only worth five or six billion on his own…

    • DavidH 09:39 on 2026-06-24 Permalink

      @Joey, they still plan on getting rid of most of the parking lot. The city plans to destroy the current outdoor swimming pool and build a new one where the parking lot is. The plan is super expensive and made very little sense until now. (See the link for the petition in SMD’s latest post).

  • Kate 09:00 on 2026-06-23 Permalink | Reply  

    Notes on what’s open and closed on Wednesday for Saint‑Jean.

     

    • Kate 08:56 on 2026-06-23 Permalink | Reply  

      Why was Monday’s shooter aiming out of a window of the Hilton on Decarie? Police say the shooter’s manifesto included denunciations of pornography, and suggest that his purpose may have been to carry out an attack on Pornhub. He succeeded in blowing out several windows in the complex, directly across Decarie from the hotel, before police arrived and he turned his attention to them.

       

      • steph 09:02 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Aren’t the mindgeek offices in the “triangle” near Pare, while this was south of the tracks?

      • Kate 09:25 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Could the SPVM and La Presse both be in error?

      • Jimmy 09:28 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Aylo (formally Mindgeek) moved their offices down the street to that building across from the Hilton.

      • Chris 10:14 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Imagine planning such a thing, and scrawling 100 pages, but not googling where Aylo is now.

      • Kate 11:08 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        If he’d just arrived in town he may not have realized the entire Decarie trench sits between the hotel and the Aylo complex either.

        But obviously I wasn’t aware the buildings were side by side either!

      • MarcG 11:22 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Maybe I’m misunderstanding the angle y’all are coming from but the Hilton and the current Aylo offices appear to be right next to each other, not across the Decarie… https://maps.app.goo.gl/1oKeUcW7XHAnuH949

      • roberto 11:28 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Jimmy is correct. Steph`s info is old.

      • dhomas 11:50 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        I have a friend who used to work at Aylo (when it was Mindgeek). He still knows people there. The offices have indeed moved to spot directly across from the Hilton where the shooter was, as Jimmy mentioned.

    • Kate 19:13 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      TVA says the perpetrator of Monday’s shootings was an incel from Alberta and Radio‑Canada/CBC also give some detail on the shooter, but also mention that it was police who shot the third person who died on the scene.

      Radio-Canada has a video on this page titled “two minutes to understand what happened” but how the police action moved from the Hilton on Decarie around to the PA on de Courtrai (where, according to TVA, nothing happened) is not yet clear.

      Before this incident we had a homicide count of 10. How many will this incident add? I haven’t yet seen a number.

      Adding: The SPVM has named their fallen colleague: Mohamed Lamine Benredouane.

      CBC also names the bystander who was killed.

      I suppose the meeting between Fady Dagher and SMF was postponed?

       

      • Kevin 20:02 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        The Hilton and the PA apparently share underground parking.

      • Ian 20:45 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Aaah thank you – now it makes sense.
        Sokath, his eyes uncovered.

    • Kate 17:46 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      Cyclists should be aware that police are handing out more tickets to riders breaking the law.

       

      • Blork 18:08 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Good work as long as they’re being fair and reasonable. The tone of that JdeM report implies the cops are on an educational mission as much as anything, and that many of the people being stopped (and not all are ticketed) are not even aware of the rules. For example, you must wear a helmet when using an ELECTRIC Bixi (not required on a regular Bixi). Also, you’re not allowed to wear headphones while riding your bike. Not everyone knows this.

        Stop signs and red lights are a bit trickier. Everyone SHOULD know you’re required to stop. On the other hand, there are times and places where it just seems silly, and the good ol’ “Denver stop” is sufficient. But I don’t think the law here recognizes that.

        OK, I know you’re all wanting examples. Here’s one: cars are pretty scarce in my neighbourhood, especially outside of commuting hours. It’s not hard to ride along my street and through six or seven intersections and not see a moving car within 100 metres in any direction. Asking a cyclist to come to a full stop under those circumstances is just dumb. That doesn’t mean you can just blow through without even looking, but a full stop? Nah.

      • Ian 18:36 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

      • Joey 18:47 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Ideal would be to treat it like a crosswalk, no? You must always slow down when approaching but you don’t have to stop unless someone (pedestrian, bike or car) is crossing.

      • Nicholas 22:03 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Joey, that’s the Denver stop (or Idaho stop) that Blork was referring to: treating a stop sign as a yield sign. It’s the law in 13 US states plus DC. Plus in lots of countries stop signs are rare, they use yield signs or the default yield to traffic on the right.

        It would be great if we got this here, and one could ask their candidates this question in the upcoming election (it’s the province that regulates this).

      • Chris 22:26 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Idaho stop was heavily lobbied for during the last CSR review, but the gov did not want it.

      • Ian 22:56 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        I guess the question in terms of legislation is whether people can be trusted to use their judgement and… well, you can’t turn right on a red in Montreal for reasons, and maybe Idaho stops fall under that too. Riders blowing through stop signs and red lights like it’s a suggestion not a rule should endure an occasional reality check.

      • Nicholas 01:20 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        I would be fully supportive of stricter enforcement of cyclists putting people in danger, such as those not yielding to pedestrians everywhere, in exchange of non-enforcement of cyclists doing non-harmful things, such as going through while slowing down when there is no traffic to yield to (or wearing earbuds even in one ear, something I never do but that distracts me much less than when in a car with a loud radio and the windows up, which is completely legal).

      • DeWolf 02:07 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        To anyone on a high horse about cyclists not doing their stops, I would ask: do you? I mean a full legal stop, which requires you to stop moving completely and put your foot on the ground?

        Because that’s absurd. And it’s why approximately 99.9% of cyclists do Idaho stops.

      • Kate 09:26 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        People who demand cyclists make so many full stops have never ridden a bike in traffic. In traffic, a cyclist’s momentum is their fuel, and it’s what keeps you safe, able to move quickly when needed.

      • Chris 10:19 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        >Riders blowing through stop signs and red lights like it’s a suggestion not a rule should endure an occasional reality check.

        Agreed; but that’s not what the Idaho stop is.

        >or wearing earbuds even in one ear

        Hilariously, that’s legal for car drivers (hands-free = safe, don’t you know?), but not cyclists! Somehow operating a 1000 kg vehicle with one ear is ok, but operating a 10 kg vehicle with one ear is just too dangerous.

        >I would ask: do you? I mean a full legal stop

        Motorists don’t ever do full stops either.

      • Joey 11:33 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        I used to think talking hands-free while driving was no big deal until I apparently completely missed a stop sign on a street I had driven on hundreds of times while on the phone.

      • Tim S. 11:39 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        Stop signs: the first spark in the unthinkable but world-changing romance between Idaho libertarians and Montreal cyclists.

      • Ian 12:23 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        @chris “Motorists don’t ever do full stops either.” The fine is over 300 bucks and you lose 2 demerit points. Bicyclists not so much. Go sit by the cop station on Remembrance some morning and count the bicyclists that stop at the stop sign.

        @Joey since bike delivery, bixi, and maybe a deathwish have become increasingly common I often see people in my neighbourhood riding no-hands while consulting their phone, presumably for directions.

    • Kate 13:30 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      A policeman has been shot and a gunman is at large in Côté-des-Neiges. Posting from fone, more soon.

      A cop is dead and another person injured, but the attacker has been stopped.

      According to these reports, a police officer, another person plus the suspect are all dead.

      Watching interview with Fady Dagher, who observed that it’s 24 years since the last SPVM cop died doing their job.

      BBC covers Monday’s shooting (is Ana Faguy a relative of Fagstein’s?).

       

      • jeather 15:09 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Dislike the journalists asking him how he personally feels,come on. That said the safety of policing as a job here puts into spotlight the lack of balance in their killing innocent people.

      • steph 17:58 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        That police officer straight up murdered Michael Moshe Mizrahi. Is this going to be the straw that breaks the camels back on the “systematic racism” issue?

      • Blork 18:14 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        I don’t understand the sequence of events. Apparently the shooter was in a room at the Hilton overlooking the scene, but there’s video of the cops busting the glass on the PA store and going in there. What’s the connection?

      • bob 09:07 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        That police officer did not “murder” anyone, she reacted to what she perceived as the shooter coming at her, and shortly after that was wounded herself.

      • Ian 16:45 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        She panicked and killed a civilian but cops don’t get charged even with manslaughter. I guess steph was joking about the “anti anti semitic” crowd but it”s not like the cop shot Mizrahi for being black.

    • Kate 09:08 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      Flooding remains the biggest story Monday, many householders still coping with the aftermath.

       

      • jeather 12:59 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Really cursed us with that “biggest story”.

      • Kate 14:51 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        No kidding.

    • Kate 08:25 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      I was wondering as I read about the UK Labour prime minister leaving office voluntarily part way through his term to make way for a more popular choice as leader – has something like this ever happened in Canada?

       

      • CE 08:53 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        This doesn’t look too much different from Trudeau’s resignation last year.

      • Kate 09:16 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Short memory here. You’re right.

      • Joey 09:18 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        It was a voluntary resignation but the lede makes it clear that his choices were quite limited – “… forced out by his own party after missteps and mistakes…”

        Same thing more or less happened to Francois Legault earlier this year (though obviously at different moments in both his career and his mandate, but broadly…).

      • Tim S. 11:35 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        I would draw the Chretien-Martin analogy, since it seems Starmer’s choice was forced by the election of a rival who would have made internal party politics extremely difficult for him.

      • CE 12:36 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        I was also thinking of Chrétien but wasn’t he already planning to retire and just wanted to set up the next leader for the upcoming election?

      • Ian 18:40 on 2026-06-22 Permalink

        Chretien was going to retire but then refused when he felt he was being forced out. He intentionally screwed over Paul Martin, which led to that long period where the Liberals were searching and searching for a viable candidate until they finally had the brainflash to make Trudeau do it and just shadow government the whole shebang until he found his feet. I personally blame Chretien for Harper. In the end Carney’s not much better than Harper was, but hey.

    • Kate 08:22 on 2026-06-22 Permalink | Reply  

      Police chief Fady Dagher is to meet with the mayor and other elected officials Monday, behind closed doors.

      CBC reports on a relevant incident from last fall, in which a Black family holding a birthday party in their back yard in Montreal North was allegedly pepper sprayed by police, including the senior parents.

       

      • Ian 20:39 on 2026-06-23 Permalink

        How is that they got pepper sprayed “alleged”? I understand the legality of saying x did y as opposed to x is alleged to have possibly committed something against y but in this instance we kniw for a fact the family got pepper sprayed and that’s not even being debated.

    • Kate 19:04 on 2026-06-21 Permalink | Reply  

      CTV has put together a useful piece on what you need to know if your home has been flooded.

       

      • Kate 09:45 on 2026-06-21 Permalink | Reply  

        cat reading newspaperThe Middle East was unavoidable this week, with no one quite knowing how things will progress.

        There was surprisingly little about the World Cup, although Chloé linked it with the FIFA peace award.

        Côté and Chapleau both commented wordlessly on the Montreal police scandal.

        The intricacies of Quebec politics was the topic de la semaine. The exodus of names from the CAQ in advance of the election was one theme that was widely covered, with various metaphors, and the arrival of a new candidate another. The lurking presence of Dubé and Legault was effectively spoofed by Ygreck, as was Fréchette’s advantage in watching PSPP and Charles Milliard squaring off.

        However, Côté on the kangaroo was the single best cartoon of the week.

         

        • Kate 09:06 on 2026-06-21 Permalink | Reply  

          Ian Lafrenière – who originally came to public notice as a spokesman for the SPVM, let’s not forget – has named an “independent” observer into the SPVM’s investigation into racism at station 39.

          And yes, I put scare quotes there on purpose, qatzelok.

           

          • jeather 10:51 on 2026-06-21 Permalink

            An observer is okay as a start — we need an inquiry too, though they do need a non-cop there watching — and she’s a lot more independent than I would have guessed they would choose (based on looking her up — she’s an academic). I’m not entirely convinced but it’s not the worst choice I can imagine.

        ← Older posts

        c
        Compose new post
        j
        Next post/Next comment
        k
        Previous post/Previous comment
        r
        Reply
        e
        Edit
        o
        Show/Hide comments
        t
        Go to top
        l
        Go to login
        h
        Show/Hide help
        shift + esc
        Cancel