(Ottawa) Canadian Nathaniel Veltman, described as a white supremacist, sought to spread fear among the country’s Muslims when he killed four members of a family by running them over with a van in June 2021, the prosecutor said Tuesday .
The man, now 22, is accused of deliberately mowing down five members of the Afzaal family in London, about 200 kilometers southwest of Toronto, killing both parents, a 15-year-old daughter and grandmother.
Only the 9-year-old boy, who was seriously injured, survived.
“Nathaniel Veltman had a message for Muslims. This message was strong, this message was brutal and this message was terrifying: ‘Leave this country or you and your loved ones could be next,’” prosecutor Fraser Ball said as he concluded a historic trial.
Started ten weeks ago, this trial could indeed create a legal precedent by establishing that violence perpetrated in the name of white nationalism constitutes an offense under Canada’s anti-terrorism law – introduced in 2001 after the Al-Qaeda attacks on American soil.
The accused, who had no previous criminal record and no known affiliation with an extremist organization, pleaded not guilty when his trial opened in early September.
Prosecutor Fraser Ball said the jury had “everything necessary to convict in this case”, including the accused’s confession to police.
He recalled that Nathaniel Veltman had written a “terrorist manifesto,” found on his computer, in which he advocated white nationalism and described his hatred of Muslims.
The accused had “dressed like a soldier”, with a bulletproof vest and a helmet. “He was looking for Muslims to kill,” Fraser Ball said in his findings.
Shortly before, the defense lawyer had for his part rejected the notion of premeditation. “When he left his apartment on the evening of June 6, he had no plan,” argued Christopher Hicks.
According to the latter, the jury must also take into account the mental disorders of the accused which was also diminished by his consumption of hallucinogenic mushrooms.
This killing constituted one of the deadliest attacks against Muslims in Canada with the shooting at the Quebec mosque which left six dead in 2017.
The perpetrator of the shooting, a Canadian supremacist, had not been charged with an act of terrorism.