Canadian Christian Trump Fan Shoots Six During Mosque Prayers in Quebec

[Peter Lemkin]

Quebec mosque shooting: Alexandre Bissonnette faces 11 charges

[URL="http://montrealgazette.com/author/csolyom"]CATHERINE SOLYOM, MONTREAL GAZETTE
More from Catherine Solyom, Montreal Gazette[/URL]

Published on: January 31, 2017 | Last Updated: January 31, 2017 11:43 AM EST

Alexandre Bissonnette is escorted to a van after appearing in court the day after the deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City.JACQUES BOISSINOT / THE CANADIAN PRESS

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QUEBEC Handcuffed in the prisoner's box, Alexandre Bissonnette bowed his head as the charges against him were read out late Monday after a shooting spree at a Quebec City Mosque that has shaken the community, Muslims and non-Muslims alike:
Six counts of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder using a restricted firearm.
Though police and politicians have spoken of terrorism since the 27-year-old student allegedly opened fire just after the last prayers on Sunday, Bissonnette was not charged with any terrorism-related offences.
Asked why, Crown prosecutor Thomas Jacques said Bissonnette was charged according to the evidence available.
"But you'll understand that the events happened very recently," Jacques told reporters. "The investigation is ongoing."

Bissonnette, who was a student in the faculty of social sciences at Université Laval, just a short drive from the mosque that was attacked, showed no emotion during his brief hearing at the Quebec City courthouse.
His lawyer did not enter a plea, and the accused will next appear in court on Feb. 21.
In a press release issued late Monday night, Héma-Québec announced that the Quebec mosque shooting suspect was one of its employees.
Héma-Québec expressed its deepest sympathies to the families of the victims of the tragedy and will not provide any further comments regarding Bissonnette so as not to hinder the police investigation.
Earlier in the day, police searched the home of Bissonnette's parents in the Cap-Rouge district of Quebec City.
The young man, who appears to have acted alone despite initial reports of a second gunman, did not have a previous criminal record and was known as an introvert, and a victim of bullying in school.

Alexandre Bissonnette, a 27-year-old student at Université Laval, was studying anthropology before switching to political science. FACEBOOK

Posts on his Facebook page show he "liked" Donald Trump, French Front National leader Marine Le Pen and Mathieu Bock-Cóté, a Quebec City columnist known for his pro-nationalist and anti-multicultural views.
He dressed up as the Grim Reaper for Halloween, and his musical tastes ranged from Katy Perry to Megadeth.
Bissonnette's father is listed in the sales deed of the house as an investigator. And according to Bissonnette's Facebook page, which has since been taken off-line, his grandfather was a decorated war hero.
But Bissonnette's page does not reveal a great deal about his possible motivations.
A fellow university student, who also knew Bissonnette from high school in Cap-Rouge, said the accused had developed radical views.

"He was not overtly racist or Islamophobic, but he had borderline misogynist, Islamophobic viewpoints," said Vincent Boissonneault, who is taking International Studies at Université Laval. "Unfortunately, that's become more or less acceptable these days."

Bissonnette did not show signs of mental illness or paranoia, Boissonneault said, adding he didn't think he was part of an organized extremist group, either.


An organization devoted to helping refugees in the capital city said Bissonnette's name and photograph, as they surfaced in the media Monday, were already familiar to them.
On a Facebook post, the organization Bienvenue aux réfugiés said Bissonnette was "unfortunately known by several activists in Quebec City for his viewpoints that were pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist, as expressed in social media and at Université Laval."
Reached by phone, François Deschamps, the founder of the group, which matches Syrian families with volunteers who want to help them, did not want to go into detail about Bissonnette while the police investigation is ongoing.
But he spoke of the polarization of Quebec City between those who warmly welcomed the Syrian refugees and others, particularly on certain local radio stations, whose anti-immigrant discourse has become increasingly harsh.
"Quebec City's population is white and francophone, and *we already heard discourse that was a little xenophobic before the refugees arrived,* so we were afraid of what could happen," Deschamps said. "And yet, the welcome was much stronger than what we expected."
That said, Deschamps said he was not surprised at the events Sunday at the Centre Culturel Islamique de Québec, in which six people were killed.
The mosque has been the target of several hate crimes. A pig's head was placed on its doorstep last year.

An unidentified couple with a bouquet approaches the Centre Culturel Islamique de Québec in Quebec City, Monday, Jan. 30, 2017, the morning after 6 ppl were fatally shot at the mosque. PHIL CARPENTER / MONTREAL GAZETTE

"I feel infinite sadness and the feeling that there were so many warning signs about the extreme right that we didn't want to take seriously," Deschamps said. "We want to think we are good and nice, but there are so many far-right groups that are extremely well-organized."
One group, Atalante, put recruitment posters up around CEGEP and university campuses in Quebec City just last week that said: "Defend your identity join the ranks."
One Quebec City resident, who was formerly a neo-Nazi, said he felt relations between Muslims and non-Muslims in Quebec City were still good. "But I don't know if that'll change now," said Maxime Fiset.
Half of the extreme right-wing groups in Quebec one of which now has 43,000 members on its private Facebook page are based in and around Quebec City, said Fiset, who now studies extreme-right radicalization at Université Laval and is a consultant with the Centre for the Prevention of Radicalization Leading to Violence in Montreal.
He said these groups are trying to gain legitimacy, and so would not commit such an act.
"They will officially condemn it," Fiset added. "But in private they will drink to it. It helps them someone will be knocked off the fence on the issue of Islam and they'll say see this is what happens when you allow Muslims in the country."
A second man, Mohamed Belkhadir, an engineering student at Université Laval, was initially arrested Sunday night but later released. He spoke out about what happened to him Monday.
He told La Presse that he was trying to provide first aid to shooting victims when police mistook him for a suspect. But he didn't hold anything against police, he said.
Belkhadir, who called 911 after hearing 15 to 20 seconds of gunfire, said he fled when he saw someone with a firearm. He thought it was the shooter; in fact, it was a police officer.