OTTAWA: A 19-year-old student has been charged with killing six people including four children, with the youngest less than three months old, inside a townhouse in the suburb of Ottawa, the capital city of Canada, local media reported Thursday.
Febrio De-Zoysa is charged with six counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder. Police said he is a Sri Lankan national who is believed to be in Canada as a student, Xinhua quoted the CBC News report.
The victims, a mother, her four children and a family acquaintance, are newcomers to Canada and are originally from Sri Lanka, the report said.
Police confirmed that the homicides late Wednesday night are considered the worst mass killing in the city’s recent history, CBC News reported.
In an earlier interview on CBC News, the police had initially called the incident a “mass shooting”, but it was not. An “edged weapon” was used by the killer, the report said.
Police said De-Zoysa is also an acquaintance of the family and was living in the home at the time of the killings. He was arrested about 15 kilometres south of Ottawa’s downtown core, the report said.
According to CTV News, the Sri Lankan High Commission has been told by Ottawa police that the six victims are of Sri Lankan decent and are assisting the police notifying the next of kin in Sri Lanka.-Bernama
