A teacher was stabbed by a student at John F. Kennedy School, in the Saint-Michel district, Thursday morning in Montreal. There would be no fear for the life of the elderly man in his forties. A 16-year-old suspect was apprehended after a brief police operation.
The Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM) reports that the armed attack took place around 10:10 a.m. in this English-speaking elementary and secondary school on Villeray Street.
During the altercation, the teacher “was attacked by a sharp or sharp object by a student, in a room”, confirmed the spokesperson for the police force, Jean-Pierre Brabant.
He adds that on their arrival, the police located the victim who allegedly suffered a “minor injury” to his upper body. The teacher was transported to a hospital center, where there would be no fear for his life.
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
The students were partially confined during the research. They will stay in the school until the end of the day, as a preventive measure.
Searches were carried out “inside the school” to locate the suspect, said Constable Brabant. The students were partially confined during the research. They will stay in the school until the end of the day, as a preventive measure. The suspect, a 16-year-old young man, was eventually located and stopped by the police near the school.
He did not resist his arrest and will be met by investigators over the next few hours.
According to Michael Cohen, spokesperson for the English Montreal School Board (CSEM), the student arrested, who is in 3e secondary, had “disciplinary” problems, but so far there was no indication that he might be violent. “It was completely unexpected,” he summed up.
Social intervention teams were called to the scene to “speak with the students”, some of whom witnessed the assault and are “in shock”, Mr. Cohen also said. “We are very lucky that the police acted quickly,” he said in passing.
No other person was injured during the events.
Several police officers were dispatched to the scene. The SPVM tactical intervention group intervened in particular.
Reactions in Quebec
The violent incident took place during Question Period in the National Assembly. At the exit of the Blue Room, when the suspect had just been arrested, the ministers Geneviève Guilbault (Public Security) and Jean-François Roberge (Education) said they were disturbed by this “disturbing and dramatic” event. Psychosocial support will be offered to students and staff, they said.
Mr. Roberge made a link between this act and the resurgence of violence in Montreal. “So goes violence in the community, so are the incidents that can happen in schools,” he said.
PHOTO JACQUES BOISSINOT, ARCHIVES THE CANADIAN PRESS
Jean-Francois Roberge
He has not received any signals from the school network regarding an increase in violence in schools in recent months. “I did not receive a note to that effect. But we know very well that when there is an upsurge in violence in the streets, young people circulate in the streets and circulate in schools, they are the same people ”, we must be“ vigilant ”, he said. Explain.
It does not have a statistical portrait about the presence or seizure of weapons in schools. “I cannot tell you that we are observing an upward curve. It’s really up to the school service centers and school administrators to oversee what is going on. We have to be careful, we have an incident, an incident which is very serious and which could have been dramatic, but we must not think that there, weapons are circulating in schools more than before and that it is dangerous to send our children there. He stressed that at school, “we are in a place where we do prevention, not repression or arrests.”
Geneviève Guilbault spoke about her recently announced measures to prevent violence in the metropolis. “It is not normal that our young people have this reflex of violence,” she said. “We must intervene and ensure that young people do not commit acts like what has just been committed.”
“Anything we’re doing against guns right now, it wouldn’t have changed that act, it wasn’t a gun. So there is a problem of violence at the source because young people sometimes lack, in some places, constructive alternatives, lack constructive life projects, lack access to services, to people who can to be role models and to help them to walk righteously in life. And that’s why we act in prevention, ”she said.