Pat Dollard

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Here you go boys & girls: UPDATE #8

Winnipeg Sun

August 1, 2008

RCMP identify man accused of beheading victim

RCMP have identified a 40-year-old Edmonton man accused of repeatedly stabbing and then beheading 22-year-old Winnipegger Tim McLean on a Greyhound bus in southern Manitoba on Wednesday night.

RCMP said Vince Weiguang Li is charged with second-degree murder. He is scheduled to appear in court in Portage la Prairie today.

McLean’s friends have identified him as the victim of Wednesday’s shocking and horrific attack, which occurred around 8:30 p.m. while the eastbound bus was 20 km west of Portage on the Trans-Canada Highway.

The driver immediately pulled to the side of the highway and everyone but the suspect and McLean scrambled off. RCMP arrested a man without incident during a standoff at 1:30 a.m. Thursday.

Police have not yet said what the motive was. Witnesses said it appears it was a random attack.

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Update #7

Just acquired Police Scanner audio from the bus attack yesterday: Perp identified as “Asian” – NOW, what part of Asia are we talking about?

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UPDATE #6

August 1, 2008 5:00 AM
(CNN) — Tributes have started pouring in for the young man beheaded in Canada while traveling home on a bus.

The Canadian Press named the dead man as Tim McLean, 22, of Winnipeg.

McLean was repeatedly stabbed and then decapitated by the man sitting next to him on a Greyhound Canada bus Thursday west of Portage la Prairie in Manitoba.

Garnet Caton, who was sitting in front of McLean, talked of a “bloodcurdling scream” when the attack began.

“It was like something between a dog howling and a baby crying, I guess you could say,” Caton said. “I don’t think it will leave me for a while.” Watch Caton describe what he saw »

Passengers exited the bus, and a trucker who stopped provided wrenches and crowbars to several of them so they could keep the suspect on the bus until police came, witnesses told Canadian TV.

The suspect was seized with the help of negotiators, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Sgt. Steve Colwell said. Watch Colwell discuss the case »

He said no formal charges had been filed, and he declined to identify either the man in custody or the victim, who were among 34 passengers.

However, several media outlets, including Canadian Press, named McLean and said he had been returning home after working on a booth at an Alberta fair.

William Caron, 23, of Winnipeg, told Canadian Press he had known McLean since they went to school together.

“I knew he was coming back from the [exhibition]… my brother was supposed to go meet him at the bus depot and he never showed up. And then my younger brother and my other brother went to go to his parents’ place to see if they know anything, and they saw a bunch of news people there. And then they asked at his parents’ and that’s how we found out,” Caron said.

By early Friday there were scores of condolence messages on Facebook groups set up to remember McLean.

Continued @ CNN

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Update 5

OK this is getting even more freaky:

Beheading on bus shocks Canada, cannibalism feared

Still no mention of a name for the perp. They did say the suspect is not from Manitoba.

We taking bets?

Update #4

Airport-style safety precautions impossible for buses: Greyhound

Also, Police are still refusing to reveal the name of the perp and the victim. Victim pending family notification.

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Update #3

Released 3 minutes ago:

Winnipeg Sun

The man who witnesses allege repeatedly stabbed and then beheaded a male on a Greyhound bus last night is 40 years old and from out of province, RCMP said today.

RCMP would not release the man’s name or any information about the victim, including his name, age or hometown. Police believe the victim was travelling solo.

The suspect has not yet been charged. He was arrested following a three-hour standoff and is in police custody.

RCMP would not comment on the suspect’s mental health.

Witnesses said the gruesome and horrific attack was unprovoked, but RCMP said they don’t know if it was random or prompted by something.

More at the link aboove….

MORE DETAILS:

With Video

AOL News

A passenger repeatedly stabbed and then decapitated a young man aboard a Greyhound bus travelling through Manitoba overnight in what appears to be a random attack, a witness said Thursday.

The RCMP would not confirm the reports, only saying that a “major incident” took place late Wednesday evening on the bus as it drove along the Trans-Canada Highway en route to Winnipeg from Edmonton.

A man was taken into custody after an hours-long standoff with police ended around 1 a.m. near Portage la Prairie, a city about 85 kilometres west of Winnipeg, according to reports.

Passenger Garnet Caton, who was sitting in the seat in front of the victim, told CBC News in gruesome detail how he saw the attacker stab his seatmate, a young man sleeping with his headphones on.

Caton said he heard a “blood-curdling scream” and turned around to see the attacker holding a large “Rambo” hunting knife above the victim, “continually stabbing him in the chest area.”

“He must have stabbed him 50 times or 60 times,” said Caton.

As panicked passengers fled the bus, “the attacker was over top of the victim … continually cutting him. I think the victim was gone at that point,” Caton said.

Caton, the driver and a trucker who had stopped at the scene later boarded the vehicle to see if the victim was still alive.

“When we came back on the bus, it was visible at the end of the bus he was cutting the guy’s head off and pretty much gutting him up,” said Caton.

The attacker ran at them, Caton said, and they ran out of the bus, holding the door shut as he tried to slash at the trio.

When the attacker tried to drive the bus away, the driver disabled the vehicle, Caton said.

“While we were watching the door, he calmly walks up to the front with the head in his hand and the knife and just calmly stares at us and drops the head right in front of us,” said Caton.

Caton described the attacker as surprisingly calm. “It was like he was at the beach or something. There was no rage in him. He wasn’t swearing or cursing or anything. It was just like he was a robot or something.”

Police cruisers arrived about 10 minutes after the attack began, he estimates, and officers began directing passengers to school buses to take them to a hotel in Brandon.

“While we were waiting on the side of the road, [the attacker] was taunting the police with the head in his hand,” said Caton.

Caton described the attacker as appearing “totally normal” earlier in the journey, even chatting with a young woman as he smoked a cigarette during a break.

But when he got back on the bus, he moved his belongings from the front to a seat beside the victim in the back and about 20 minutes later began attacking the man, said Caton. “He didn’t say anything to the victim at all,” said Caton.

A six-year-old and other children were among the passengers who saw the horrific incident unfold, said Caton.

“It was pretty traumatic,” he said, adding that some passengers said they have been unable to sleep or eat since it happened.

A chaplain and crisis team were on hand to counsel passengers at the hotel, he said.

Officers were still at the scene early Thursday and brought portable search lights to examine the bus, the CBC’s Sean Kavanagh reported. Traffic was being rerouted to a side road.

Abby Wambaugh, media relations spokeswoman for Greyhound Canada, said there were 37 passengers and a driver aboard the bus.

She would not comment on what happened on the bus.

“I don’t want to compromise the investigation, so any details need to be confirmed by the police,” she said.
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Sun News Canada

July 31, 2008

PORTAGE LA PRAIRIE, Man. — A man was stabbed to death then beheaded on a Greyhound bus in an apparent random act of violence, according to an eyewitness.

All lanes of traffic on the Trans-Canada Highway remained closed Thursday morning west of Portage la Prairie as the RCMP investigated what they would only refer to as “a major incident” on the bus that was headed from Edmonton to Winnipeg.

At about 8:45 p.m. the vehicle was stopped in the eastbound lane following an apparent assault.

Garnet Caton, one of 37 passengers on the bus, said he witnessed the attack.

“We all heard this scream, this like blood-curdling scream,” Caton told CBC Newsworld.

He alleged the suspect had a “large hunting knife” and repeatedly stabbed the victim “like 50 or 60 times.”

“The attacker was calmy over top of the victim continually cutting him. I think the victim was gone at that point,” Caton told the CBC.

He said the victim appeared to be sleeping before the attack and the suspect was not acting out of the ordinary.

The bus was evacuated, but Caton said he was one of a handful of witnesses who saw the suspect allegedly trying to behead the body.

The suspect later appeared at the front of the bus, he said.

“He calmly walked up to the front (of the bus) with (the victim’s) head in his hand and the knife and then dropped the head in front of us,” Caton said, adding he believes the suspect later returned to the back of the bus and was seen later “taunting police with the head in his hand out the window.”

Caton said the suspect appeared calm.

“What struck me, it was like he was at the beach or something,” he said.

The incident took place about 20 kilometres west of Portage.

A Sun Media reporter on the scene reported about three dozen people from the bus were standing outside the vehicle on the highway following the incident.

A female passenger said she heard screams and heard “there was a stabbing.”

“They told us to get off the bus,” said the woman who did not provide her name.

Another woman at the scene said the passengers were being evacuated from one bus and loaded onto another waiting Greyhound bus.

At one point, Mounties surrounded the bus with one officer standing just a few feet away from an unidentified man sitting in the driver’s seat.

A man was taken into custody after the standoff with police.

Portage RCMP Const. Dave Higgs, who was on the scene, reported “there was a major incident on the bus,” and did not provide any other details.

“I can confirm there was an incident on one of our buses,”Abby Wambaugh, media relations spokeswoman for Greyhound Canada, said late Wednesday night.

Wambaugh said a management team would be waiting in Brandon to meet the passengers when they arrived “to take care of any needs they may have,” including accommodation, transfers to other buses or even trauma counselling, if necessary. — With files from Canadian Press