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| Hyde Park and South Carriage, 10:14 a.m. |
At around 8:40 last night, at a #ldnont intersection not five minutes from our home, 20-year-old Nathaniel Veltman plowed his pickup truck into a family of five people, killing three adults and one teenager, and seriously injuring the sole surviving member of this family, a nine-year-old boy.
Veltman drove off, and was arrested in a strip mall parking lot about 4 km away.
This was no accident. Police say they’ve collected evidence the driver deliberately targeted this family because of their Muslim faith. A hate crime. Here. The worst mass murder in this city’s history.
Veltman has been charged with 4 counts of murder and one of attempted murder. I’m not going to use words like “alleged”. There was no justice for this family taking a walk in a supposedly safe neighborhood, and I won’t give this cretin the benefit of assuming innocence until proven guilty.
Hatred led to this, and it came from somewhere. As we process our individual and collective shock, I hope we ask ourselves what we plan to do next.
What are we prepared to do to ensure anyone, of any background, can stroll the streets near home without fear of being targeted simply because of what they believe, or who they are?
What will we do to stop the cycle of intolerance that drives Islamophobia and other forms of racism and xenophobia? When will we say enough?
Members of minorities understand what it’s like to be singled out. Whatever our background, whether we’re visible minorities or not, sooner or later it happens to us all, simply because a stranger decided we didn’t deserve to feel safe.
Or to live.
So I’ll say it here: enough.
#london #ontario #canada #hydepark #southcarriage #cherryhill #callitwhatitis #murder #enough
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