Bus Rider Decapitates Fellow Passenger

[Kanastrous]

If I didn't see an opening to put a slug in his medulla oblongata more or less right away, I would certainly be running, too.

[Enigma]

Yeah, if it was alongside the road and 36 people started throwing rocks at him all at once, that's one thing, but the only real way to stop this attack on the bus would be to intentionally crash the bus--and that might kill a lot more people.

I do have to wager it was some member of, say, the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang, but I'm not sure if they're up in Canada. Possibly he did it simply to earn cred with the gang when he's back in jail for committing the crime, if they do exist up there.

There was a thread here in N&P about the Klan trying to get people to come to Calgary(?)(forgot which western city) and maybe this guy is one of them? Maybe trying to make a statement that the KKK is strong in western Canada?

Nevertheless, this was a premeditated act since up until the break he was at the front but then after moved to the back to be with the victim. Then he takes out a huge hunting knife and stabs the Native. Why did he carry the knife unless he was prepared to use it? I can understand someone carrying a pocket knife, but a huge "Rambo" style hunting knife? For what? He wanted to kill and found a weak non white victim.

[Broomstick]

Well, I've got a big-ass ceremonial knife I've used in public religious rituals (also a sickle, mainly because I couldn't find a real, full-size scythe) that I've carried on train rides (no fucking way I could get that on a commercial airplane) but it's been buried in my luggage, not easily accessible, as I see absolutely no reason I would need to have it readily available. Yeah, it's a strange reason, but while I can conceive of a reason to carry a big knife with me I still can't condone using one to kill a fellow passenger (except in self-defense, but that's clearly not what happened here).

These days, I'd probably have to transport such paraphernalia by private car.

[Erik von Nein]

Nah, you can still take those on planes (so long as you put them in your checked baggage) and trains (since they don't check your baggage at all), though you probably don't want to walk around with it strapped to you.

[Broomstick]

The last time I checked a bag for an airplane flight was in 1983, when I went to Europe. I had 1 checked bag and 1 carry on.

Even on business trips lasting the better part of a week I've always taken just a carry-on.

Yeah, I travel VERY light.

But you are correct - weapons can travel in checked baggage.

[FSTargetDrone]

He ran at them with the head of the guy he just stabbed and sawed off. Kind of frightening in a crazy guy seeing a guy soaked in blood with a huge knife running toward your direction. According to the article some people were throwing up due to the sight of it.

Yeah and something tells me that such a person wouldn't exactly be concerned about retaliation by the passengers. Talk about "shock and awe." Short of someone using a firearm, there might not have been much else that anyone could have done to stop him inside the bus.

The stabbing victim was obviously beyond help. Best bet for everyone else is to get the hell away as fast as possible.

[CaptainZoidberg]

As to what sort of human being this was - racist, schizophrenic, druggie - it's a bit early to speculate.

I'm actually sort of thinking all 3, or the 1st and 3rd. I would be amazed if even the most hardline, nutjob, drugged up neo-Nazi wouldn't be shocked by the sight of a decapitated human head.

I'm guessing the driver disabled the bus by tripping a fuel shut-off valve. It would be quick and reliable.

[Superboy]

The local news just said that there are now reports that the man began eating his victim after killing him.

[TithonusSyndrome]

The local news just said that there are now reports that the man began eating his victim after killing him.

This leads me to believe the perpetrator was native as per Bear's suggestion of Wendigo psychosis, and reporting stories of crimes committed by natives in this country is blase beyond the point of mention on one hand and a little un-PC on the other, especially after so many natives are stranded in the cold by cops or end up making taser headlines in this country. If these news stories don't get out east to whatever papers Torontonians read, rest assured they definitely saturate the local papers here in Alberta.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

A prison skinhead OD'ing on meth is still my best bet for what happened here. Meth can so completely detach someone from the world, and pump them so far up, that he really could have been running around in a berserker rage with a human head. The cannibalism sounds like an instinctive goring in the heat of the moment.

I wouldn't be surprised if it's later found that he not only had meth in him but that the dose probably should have killed him.

It's important to remember that meth is a really, really common drug in rural areas, too.

[TithonusSyndrome]

It's important to remember that meth is a really, really common drug in rural areas, too.

And in Edmonton it's literally as easy as walking past suspicious individuals and saying "I'm looking for some" or something to that effect. Hell, you don't even need to say anything if you look the type, and unfortunately I do. I guess it's still undecided, but I still don't think he's an AG. The AG here are loudmouths and assholes, but seldom ever get arrested for violent crimes as opposed to petty larceny.

[hongi]

It's just so...bizarre. Horiffic of course, beyond horrific. But I literally cannot wrap my head around it. That sort of stuff just doesn't happen.

[Raw Shark]

A prison skinhead OD'ing on meth is still my best bet for what happened here. Meth can so completely detach someone from the world, and pump them so far up, that he really could have been running around in a berserker rage with a human head. The cannibalism sounds like an instinctive goring in the heat of the moment. [snip]

But meth kills your appetite...

[FSTargetDrone]

Another update concerning charges filed and the name of the attacker and victim:

Friends ID man killed on bus; RCMP charge suspect

This story contains graphic details

Last Updated: Friday, August 1, 2008 | 9:26 AM ET

Friends are describing the victim of a gruesome killing aboard a Winnipeg-bound Greyhound bus as a bubbly young man who was returning home from working at a carnival in Edmonton.

Police have not confirmed the identity of the man stabbed to death aboard a bus late Wednesday and beheaded, according to witness accounts, but friends have said it was Tim McLean Jr., 22, of Winnipeg.

RCMP announced Friday morning that they have charged Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton with second-degree murder. He is scheduled to appear at the Manitoba provincial court in Portage la Prairie.

Second-degree murder, under the Criminal Code, is commonly defined as unpremeditated murder, or murder that is not first degree. First-degree murder refers to a killing that is planned and deliberate, but also when death is caused by sexual assault, aggravated sexual assault, kidnapping and forcible confinement.

In an e-mail to CBC News, friend Jossie Kehler wrote that McLean was loved by everyone, had a bubbly personality and was a ladies' man.

"He has a lot of friends and they are all very upset he's gone, and they would like to say they miss him and he will always be in their hearts," she wrote.

Hundreds of Facebook users flocked Friday to a tribute group titled R.I.P Tim McLean set up overnight to send their condolences to family and friends as well as express their shock at the grisly story that made international headlines.

"R.I.P Tim McLean, You are loved and you will be missed dearly!" the site description read.

On the victim's MySpace page, he describes himself as a short, five-foot-five guy, weighing about 125 pounds.

Witnesses described his attacker as a hulking figure in sunglasses who boarded at the last stop and abruptly moved to a seat beside the victim.
Father trying to confirm son was victim

McLean's father, Tim McLean Sr., told CBC News on Thursday night that he was in the process of trying to get confirmation from the police that his son was, in fact, the victim.

"It's a phone call no parent ever wants to make, but it's one Tim McLean Sr. had to make last night," CBC's Karen Pauls reported early Friday.

"He got home from work to news of a horrific murder on a Greyhound bus and the possibility that his son was the victim. He had to call RCMP for confirmation."

The father said his son had sent him a text message as the bus was leaving Brandon, the last leg of its journey, to ask if he could come home for the night. Tim McLean Jr. was returning to Winnipeg from Edmonton, where he had been working at an exhibition.

The father told his son that, of course, he could come home, and that was the last contact he had with him.

The RCMP would not confirm the reports of beheading, saying only that a stabbing took place around 8:30 p.m. CT on an eastbound Greyhound bus on the Trans-Canada Highway about 20 kilometres west of Portage la Prairie.

An autopsy was scheduled for Friday at the Winnipeg Health Sciences Centre.

Witnesses said the victim got on the bus in Edmonton. His attacker came aboard in Brandon and sat away from the victim toward the front of the bus, they said. After a short cigarette break, however, the attacker moved his belongings and chose a seat beside the young man.

Garnet Caton, who was sitting in the seat in front of the victim, said the young man was sleeping with his headphones on when he was attacked.

Caton said he heard a "blood-curdling scream" and turned around to see the attacker holding a large "Rambo" hunting knife above the victim, "continually stabbing him in the chest area."
Passengers fled

"He must have stabbed him 50 times or 60 times," said Caton, who jumped out of his seat when he realized what was happening and began ushering passengers to the front of the bus.

As panicked passengers fled the bus, "the attacker was over top of the victim … continually cutting him. I think the victim was gone at that point," Caton said.

Caton, the driver and a trucker who had stopped at the scene later boarded the vehicle to see if the victim was still alive.

"When we came back on the bus, it was visible at the end of the bus he was cutting the guy's head off and pretty much gutting him up," said Caton.

The attacker ran at them, Caton said, and they ran out of the bus, holding the door shut as he tried to slash at the trio.

When the attacker tried to drive the bus away, the driver disabled the vehicle, Caton said.

"While we were watching the door, he calmly walks up to the front with the head in his hand and the knife and just calmly stares at us and drops the head right in front of us," said Caton.

Another passenger, Cody Olmstead, said: "They did an awesome thing, holding him in there, because if not, what would have happened?"

RCMP crisis negotiators communicated with the suspect for several hours while he was on the bus. Around 1:30 a.m., he attempted to jump from a bus window and was subdued and arrested, RCMP said.

Police cruisers arrived about 10 minutes after the attack began, he estimated, and officers began directing passengers to school buses to take them to a hotel in Brandon.

[FSTargetDrone]

I wanted to add, doesn't that second-degree murder charge seem a bit odd? That is, no premeditation. Perhaps the police/prosecutors will change the charge to first-degree. If I were to guess, given the details in the article, the attacker seemed to have been planning to do what he did. I don't see how this wasn't "planned and deliberate."

[Broomstick]

Could it be because the victim was a target of opportunity (wrong place at the wrong time) rather than the perpetrator hunting down that specific individual? That he, he might have planned to kill, but not that particular person. Rather, any suitable victim who happened to be around at the time would have been targeted.

[Maxentius]

Could it be because the victim was a target of opportunity (wrong place at the wrong time) rather than the perpetrator hunting down that specific individual? That he, he might have planned to kill, but not that particular person. Rather, any suitable victim who happened to be around at the time would have been targeted.

I'm no student of law, but if this abhorrent motherfucker got on the bus with a knife in his bag and the intent to violently murder anyone, is that not premeditation? It seems to me like it doesn't matter he had no specific victim, but the mere fact he had planned to kill anyone should suffice.

[Broomstick]

Well, as a human being with empathy and intelligence I am inclined to agree with you. However, I am not the law, which is often quirky and odd to the normal mind.

[hongi]

RCMP announced Friday morning that they have charged Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton with second-degree murder. He is scheduled to appear at the Manitoba provincial court in Portage la Prairie.

Obviously it ain't a skinhead (although that doesn't rule out racism). I just think this guy is insane.

[White Haven]

The fact that he got up with his luggage, moved to the back of the bus, sat down next to his victim, and THEN murdered him somewhat screams 'Gee, I didn't want to murder the living fuck out of the guy I was sitting next to before. This guy, however, can burn.'

[FSTargetDrone]

The victim is described as being 125 pounds and five feet, five inches high. That's somewhat on the slim, small side, so perhaps the attacker got on the bus, looked around and finally decided on a passenger apparently traveling alone that he thought he could, well, deal with successfully.

[Death from the Sea]

article

GOIANIA, Brazil (AP) -- Police have accused a Brazilian man of killing and dismembering his 17-year-old British girlfriend, taking pictures of her body parts with his cell phone and stuffing her torso in a suitcase.

Officers found the suitcase with the torso of Cara Marie Burke at the edge of a river Monday in this central Brazilian city, Goias state police inspector Jorge Moreira da Silva said.

Burke's boyfriend, Mohamed D'Ali Carvalho Santos, 20, was arrested and charged with homicide Thursday after "he confessed he cut her up and even photographed the body on his cellular phone," Silva said.

One photo appeared to have been taken in a bathroom shower stall, showing Burke's severed head placed on the chest of her torso along with a bloody butcher knife.

Silva said Santos confessed he killed Burke because she threatened to tell his parents he was a drug dealer addicted to cocaine, and she was considering turning him in to police.

After fatally stabbing Burke on Saturday, Santos left her body in the bathroom and went to a party, returning to dismember her the next day, the police inspector said.

Burke's family in England identified her from a tattoo that said "Mum" after images of the body were broadcast on TV, Silva said.

Burke met Santos in London, where his mother lives, Silva said. She had been in Brazil for about three months.

Police were still searching Thursday for Burke's head and limbs, which Santos said he hid in a rural area outside town. Taken out of his cell in handcuffs to be filmed by television crews, he held his head down and said nothing.

Karine Neves, a spokeswoman for the British Embassy in Brasilia, said a British vice consul is in Goiania tracking the case and the police investigation.

Burke's online acquaintances demanded justice in messages they posted on her Web page on Orkut, an online social networking community hugely popular in Brazil.

The page also featured pictures of the blond teenager posing with friends in London and Brazil and holding a baby in her arms.

What the fuck? is it like worldwide beheading week or what? I mean I know it (beheadings) probably happens in the extremist Islamic countries alot more than we hear about but damn.

[ArmorPierce]

RCMP announced Friday morning that they have charged Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton with second-degree murder. He is scheduled to appear at the Manitoba provincial court in Portage la Prairie.

Obviously it ain't a skinhead (although that doesn't rule out racism). I just think this guy is insane.

The victim was some white guy. Here's his myspace http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu ... =108390479

[Maxentius]

I find his musical tastes abhorrent, but that's a trivial issue. And it's incredibly jarring to actually put a face and person to the victim of a heinous act I had only, up until now, known through news stories.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Well, I guess that rules out Wendigo psychosis or the Aryan Guard. Outside of plain old psychosis and/or meth use, I'm stumped for any explanation. Vancouver has plenty of Asian gangs, but that's neither in the vicinity of Edmonton nor a good explanation for why this might happen.