NEWS

Police seeking citizens’ images of Danforth shooting

Police are asking the many people who were on Danforth Avenue on Sunday evening to send them any photos and videos they may have taken during the shooting that left three people dead and 13 injured.

Toronto police have set up the website tps.on.ca/danforthshooting to which images can be uploaded, Chief Mark Saunders and Det. Sgt. Terry Browne told a press conference on Monday afternoon.

They also identified the two victim fatalities as an 18-year-old female from Toronto and a 10-year-old girl from the Greater Toronto Area, though they would not reveal names.

Thirteen other shooting victims, age 17 to 59, are in hospital with injuries ranging from minor to serious, according to police. “Some may have life-changing injuries,” said Browne, homicide’s lead investigator on the case.

They would not identify the suspected shooter.

“The person responsible for this has died,” Saunders said. “The suspect has received a gunshot would and I have not expanded on that nor will I.”

He would not comment further, he said, because the Special Investigation Unit (SIU), which investigates shootings involving police, has invoked its mandate to investigate this case, Saunders said.

Earlier today the SIU said the man died after an exchange of gunfire with police.

“At this stage of the investigation we do not know why this has happened yet,” Saunders said. “The investigation itself is very fluid, it is very new, it’s going to take some time.”

Browne described the crime site along Danforth Avenue as “several scenes within the scene…. It was a moving scene if you will.”

He said the incident was disturbing. “All of us as members of this community are shocked and alarmed, and should be, that this has occurred,” he said.

“But by the same token there were a lot of citizens in the area that when assistance was needed provided medical assistance to the best of their ability,” Brown said. Emergency and ambulance services were also praised for being on the scene very quickly.

Officers will be canvassing houses in the Riverdale and East York neighbourhoods north and south of Danforth over the next several days.

About a kilometre stretch of Danforth Avenue remains closed while police investigate, Saunders said. “But rest assured, it is a priority for us to release the scene to allow Danforth to open up again and to be open to business and to have traffic flow and all those other things that have affected the community.”

After it reopens, police will  have a “heightened level of uniformed presence” in the area for a while, Saunders said.