[Callandor]

Decapitated bus passenger, man was 'totally calm' during attack


BRANDON, MAN. - A young man travelling on a Greyhound bus was stabbed to death and beheaded by a stranger in a horrifying act of apparently random violence.
The incident occurred on a bus travelling from Edmonton to Winnipeg just before 10 p.m. Wednesday.
A man of about 18 who was sleeping with headphones on was attacked by his seat mate, according to the man who sat in front of them.


He was stabbed repeatedly with a large hunting knife, sending blood spraying across the interior of the bus. The driver quickly pulled over and passengers fled out the front door.
The attacker then sawed off the victim's head and carried it to the front of the bus.
The two did not apparently know one another. The victim boarded the bus in Edmonton, one witness said, and the attacker boarded in Manitoba.
A standoff with police ensued until about 1 a.m. local time.
A 40-year-old man was taken into custody.
Garnet Caton, 26, was sitting in the seat in front of the attacker.
"I was just reading a book and all of a sudden I heard a guy screaming. I turned around and the guy sitting right beside me was standing up and stabbing another guy with a big Rambo knife," he said.
"Right in the throat. Repeatedly."
The man wielding the knife had a shaved head and was wearing sunglasses, he said.
"He looked totally calm. He didn't say a word I don't think to anybody on the bus ... nothing. Just totally calm."
Mr. Caton said most passengers were sleeping at the time and didn't realize what was happening.
"I screamed 'stop the bus!' ... Everybody got the hell off, and people at the front of the bus didn't really understand what was going on. It almost turned into a trample scene there, everybody trying to get off the bus. But the guy didn't care at all. He wasn't concerned with anybody but the guy he was stabbing.
"The guy was totally calm. When he brought the head he looked at us and dropped it. It was like he was having a day at the beach. He couldn't be bothered by anything else."
Passenger Cody Olmstead from Kentville, N.S., said he had just smoked a cigarette with the victim at the last stop in Brandon. He said he believed the victim had gotten on the bus in Edmonton.
"We just left the town of Brandon and we were watching Zorro and the next thing I know I hear somebody scream and I look back and there's some big guy holding this little fellow up between the bathroom door and the seat," Mr. Olmstead told CBC News.
After passengers fled the bus and braced the door to keep the attacker inside, he returned with the victim's head, Mr. Olmstead said.
"His hand come out the door with the knife," he said. "He went back on the bus and then they [passengers] brace the door and he come back standing in the doorway with the head, looked at them, dropped the head, went back and started cutting buddy back up."
As night fell and police surrounded the bus, the suspect taunted police officers, Mr. Olmstead said.
"He comes up and he picks the head up and he's waving it in the window. I just smoked a cigarette with this man [the victim] earlier, the head, and he's shaking it back and forth at the window and it's ... intense right, it's sickening."
RCMP Sgt. Steve Colwell provided few other details at a press briefing Thursday afternoon. He referred to the crime as a stabbing, but refused to confirm whether or not the victim had been decapitated. Sgt. Colwell said the suspect was arrested just before 1:30 a.m. when he tried to escape through a broken bus window after a prolonged standoff with police.
Sgt. Colwell said the suspect, who has yet to be charged, is believed to have been from out of province. He refused to name him or the victim. He also refused to confirm the victim's age or where he is from.
Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said the violent attack is a "horrific" incident and his heart goes to the family of the victim.
However, Mr. Day played down the possibility of enacting tough security measures in Canada's bus terminals, similar to what already exists in airports.
“People should always be open to looking at precautionary measures. But let's keep in mind that as bizarre and tragic as this is, it is extremely rare,” Mr. Day said.
He also dismissed talk by some opposition MPs of a “knife registry,” saying that millions of them are bought each year simply for kitchen use. He added that there are already provisions in the Criminal Code against crimes and assaults.
Speaking at a Conservative caucus meeting, Mr. Day said he does not want to jeopardize the investigation, but added he wants to see the killer “convicted in court.”
“We want to make sure that the process is followed as aggressively as possible, a full legal process, and the perpetrator is definitely dealt with the full force of the law,” he said.
Greyhound called the event tragic but isolated.
A company spokeswoman said bus travel is the safest mode of transportation, despite the fact bus stations do not have metal detectors and other security measures used at airports.
“Due to the rural nature of our network, airport-type security is not practical. It's a very different type of system,” Abby Wambaugh said from Greyhound's corporate offices in Texas.

globeandmail.com: Decapitated bus passenger, man was 'totally calm' during attack

And this happened so close to me...wtb???

[Zardon]

thats beyond words, really - there is something really nasty about knives, even when you compare them to gun crime

[Mousey]

excuse my french but Holy shit...
How in the hell does someone do something like that to their fellow man? This guy is clearly screwed in the head..

[OmegaRED]

If you knew how many people in a given city were actually mentally unstable you'd move out to the country and live in seclusion. I have family members who work with such nutjobs and there's so many of those timebombs just ticking away.

Still, this has got to be one of the most WTF stories I've ever seen.

[Lowfat]

When I heard this yesterday I was disgusted beyond worlds. Likely because that route runs right through places I've lived.

[GutterPunk]

absolutely messed up, I wonder if the Canadians are going to see if he is an american because most canadians like to talk up their safe streets.

[Vikingod]

Terrible. I'm curious to find out more about the story, about whats wrong with the guy. Sad, they say the victim is just a kid too.

[Judas]

lol...

safe streets..

cities don't have safe streets..

small 500 or less villages have safe streets..

well aside from knowing that anything with wheels has the right away..... aka, 80mile and hour vehicles durring school breaks or launches or late a night lol

[Falstaff]

we carried knives when we were in school and had guns in our cars but we never used them on each other. I think they should go back to arming bus drivers again and this might discourage this sort of thing. Taking weapons away from everyone will not stop this sort of activity.
Better give everyone personal protection and teach them how to use it. I saw violence on buses and subways when I was a kid, even taking the tube in London. Knife violence is common all ove the world.

[Lowfat]

Originally Posted by Judas

lol...

safe streets..

cities don't have safe streets..

small 500 or less villages have safe streets..

well aside from knowing that anything with wheels has the right away..... aka, 80mile and hour vehicles durring school breaks or launches or late a night lol

Portage La Prairie doesn't even have 15K people. It is tiny. Swift Current was 15K people, and I knew of one murder in 20 years I lived there.

Originally Posted by Falstaff

we carried knives when we were in school and had guns in our cars but we never used them on each other. I think they should go back to arming bus drivers again and this might discourage this sort of thing. Taking weapons away from everyone will not stop this sort of activity.
Better give everyone personal protection and teach them how to use it. I saw violence on buses and subways when I was a kid, even taking the tube in London. Knife violence is common all ove the world.

Thing is the victim was either sleeping or listening to music with his eyes closed. Kinda hard to defend yourself.

[Judas]

still it's pretty evident that those with guns knowing that most people don't.... will tend to consider that a free run..... vs someone with guns knowing other people likely could be carrying a gun, would probably proceed with caution knowing that if they did something stupid, they'd likely end up dead anyways.

[Lowfat]

Originally Posted by Judas

still it's pretty evident that those with guns knowing that most people don't.... will tend to consider that a free run..... vs someone with guns knowing other people likely could be carrying a gun, would probably proceed with caution knowing that if they did something stupid, they'd likely end up dead anyways.

I still would beat this still would of happened. The attacker went on with his attack as if no one else was in the bus. And walking around in the bus holding up someones head, pretty sure he was seriously effed up in the head.

[Vikingod]

Police identify Canadian bus attack suspect - Yahoo! News

A man who witnesses said stabbed and beheaded his seat mate on a Greyhound bus in Canada made his first court appearance Friday, while police offered no motive for the savage attack against a 22-year-old carnival worker. ADVERTISEMENT

Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton, Alberta, has been charged with second-degree murder. He shuffled into the courtroom Friday in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba with his head bowed and feet shackled.

Second degree murder?

[Mousey]

Originally Posted by Lowfat

Thing is the victim was either sleeping or listening to music with his eyes closed. Kinda hard to defend yourself.

This is why i was reluctant to buy noise cancelling headphones o.0
but in the end i thought balls to it and did anyway lol. And i listen to them with my eyes shut, i'm a walking disaster

[cozumel]

That is one of the most shocking crimes I've seen reported in a long while. What a terrible thing for the family of the victim. My heart goes out to them.

Originally Posted by Vikingod

Second degree murder?

I'm not from US so I don't really know. What is the legal difference between first and second degree murder?

[OmegaRED]

Our streets are safe as can be in Canada!


Our buses on the other hand...

[Falstaff]

teach everyone to protect themselves or hire someone to protect you, seems to be the prevailing thought among my peers. We never know when someone will try to rob us, steal our property or victimize us so be alert, be strong and be safe. The world is going to get harder and harder to live in as we become more complacent. We are either predator or prey it seems. I am one person that will fight back, but I cannot place myself in the position of the victim, having seen terrible things myself by our own military in peace time, you just never know when the mind will snap and the body will react.

[Zelig]

Originally Posted by Vikingod

Second degree murder?

First degree murder in Canada has a precise legal definition, generally, it has to be both planned and deliberate, I'm doubtful whether this event falls under that definition.

Regardless, the maximum penalty for second degree murder is still life imprisonment.

[Callandor]

In South Africa there is no such thing as a knife. Only a gun. Columbia too I believe, armor piercing bullets instead of normal ones over there however.

[Judas]

Originally Posted by Lowfat

I still would beat this still would of happened. The attacker went on with his attack as if no one else was in the bus. And walking around in the bus holding up someones head, pretty sure he was seriously effed up in the head.

well that's quite apparent..


the chances of there being a difference if guns were more available... or weapons of any sort, is probably non excistant as this guy simply just went or was insane. And you can't predict that at all or prevent it for that matter without landing everyone behind bars all the time.

[Judas]

zelig has it right.


to be nailed with first degree murder, the killer MUST HAVE planned it beforehand or had the intention of killing a specific person, with or without a reason, it would have had to been planned before hand.

Where as someone simply running around and killing random people would only get 2nd degree..

if i recall right, there are no technical differences in the sentences, just a technicallity to show if the murderer was... for lack of a better word... more insane then the other.

[OmegaRED]

FYI, the media isn't talking too much about it but he ate the victims body parts too.

[mos2k]

Seriously Demented.

[Judas]

yeah he's one pretty ed up guy

[Iria]

Originally Posted by OmegaRED

FYI, the media isn't talking too much about it but he ate the victims body parts too.

Audio of some of the police radio calls here, indicating that the cops saw him ingesting the victim's parts. Bleh.

[Sandok]

Originally Posted by Falstaff

teach everyone to protect themselves or hire someone to protect you, seems to be the prevailing thought among my peers. We never know when someone will try to rob us, steal our property or victimize us so be alert, be strong and be safe. The world is going to get harder and harder to live in as we become more complacent. We are either predator or prey it seems. I am one person that will fight back, but I cannot place myself in the position of the victim, having seen terrible things myself by our own military in peace time, you just never know when the mind will snap and the body will react.

Tough to fight back when you get a rambo knife in your throat while sleeping

[Mousey]

Originally Posted by Sandok

Tough to fight back when you get a rambo knife in your throat while sleeping

Agreed. And on a bus too, I've never felt uneasy or in danger on a bus or train before. Now this might have just changed my mind about falling asleep

[OmegaRED]

Relax Mousey, this is one of those random freak occurrences which will not happen again. Even Al Qaeda doesn't behead people in public! Treat this like one of those urban legends where people puts AIDS needles in the seats at movie theatres and you'll sleep fine on those long bus rides.

[Mousey]

Originally Posted by OmegaRED

Relax Mousey, this is one of those random freak occurrences which will not happen again. Even Al Qaeda doesn't behead people in public! Treat this like one of those urban legends where people puts AIDS needles in the seats at movie theatres and you'll sleep fine on those long bus rides.

Holy hell i've never heard that one before, Cheers for giving me something else to be paranoid about lol
But considering the state of affairs the UK is in atm, and with more teenagers than ever being stabbed and killed on the streets (maybe just in london but i know some real headcases round here that would probably do the same thing) i'm sure you understand why i'm seriously watching my back atm

[DJ BIG T]

that guy is messed up.. i wonder what was going threw his mind when he was doing all this.