EDMONTON — Investigators have identified the man who killed eight people in Edmonton this week as 53-year-old Phu Lam, sources tell the Edmonton Journal.

 

Lam is the co-owner of the north Edmonton home where seven of the victims — including two young children — were found dead early Tuesday morning. Another victim was found shot to death in a home in south Edmonton late Monday night, Lam was discovered dead in a restaurant in the neighbouring community of Fort Saskatchewan early Tuesday.

 

Edmonton Police Chief Rod Knecht has said the attack was “planned, deliberate and targeted.”

 

“In my 39 years of policing, I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said.

 

At both the north and south Edmonton homes, memorials are springing up, as neighbours and concerned citizens leave flowers and stuffed animals to commemorate the victims of what is the worst mass murder in the city’s history.

 

Knecht has stressed the public is not in danger. “These events do not appear to be gang-related, but rather tragic incidents of domestic violence.”

 

The series of events began at 6:52 p.m. Monday when police were called to a residence in the Haddow neighbourhood in south Edmonton where they say a man entered the home, and shot and killed a woman with a 9-mm handgun, before fleeing.

 

At the time, police said the death occurred in a “family setting.”

 

Late Tuesday, police identified the woman as Cyndi Duong, 37. An autopsy confirmed she died of a gunshot wound.

 

Neighbours say Duong and her husband, David Luu, had three children ages six to 13. A grandmother also lived at the house — government documents list a 59-year-old woman, Huong Lam, as a resident at the home.

 

On Wednesday morning, a small memorial with a red heart, pink flowers and a handful of candles was outside the home on Haswell Court. Four cars were parked outside the home, and the man who answered the door would not comment on the deaths. Two women later came out of the house with the man, loaded the trunks of the cars with belongings and drove away.

 

Most neighbours said they didn’t know the family and didn’t didn’t see or hear anything unusual on Monday night.

 

It’s unclear what ties the family to the gruesome homicide scene in north Edmonton. But it seems someone at the house recognized the shooter Monday night because at that time, police said they had information on the suspect but he was not in custody.

 

Later that night, police responded to a home in the Klarvatten neighbourhood in north Edmonton after a man’s family had reported he was depressed, overly emotional and potentially suicidal.

 

Edmonton police initially said they went to the home around 8:30 p.m., but late Tuesday night they revised that time to 9:44 p.m.

 

Police walked around the exterior of the home and peered in windows and found nothing suspicious. Nobody answered the door and there was no trace of the man, so officers left. Before entering the home, police needed “reasonable and probable grounds” to do so, and did not have them at that time, Knecht said.

 

They returned just after midnight after receiving further information from a “second individual,” the chief said, although he would not elaborate on the nature of the information or who the person was.

 

 

At that time, police found the bodies of seven people inside: three women, two men, and a boy and a girl.

 

Police say the adults are all aged 25-50, and the children both younger than 10. Knecht could not say what time they had been killed.

 

Land title documents show the home is owned by Phu Lam and Thuy-Tien “Tien” Truong. Neighbours say a couple lived in the home with two children, a boy around age eight and a toddler, as well as an elderly woman.

 

Elvis, the eldest child, was a favourite in the neighbourhood. One neighbour helped him take the training wheels off his bike, while another said Elvis played with all the kids on the block and was in Grade 3 with her son.

 

Police have not officially confirmed the suspect’s identity, but sources tell the Journal that it is Lam.

 

 

On Tuesday, Knecht said the suspect, who lived at the Klarvatten home, said he has a history of violence and drug-related crimes dating back to 1987. Officers responded to the home twice in the past two years: in November 2012 for domestic violence, sex assault and threats and in 2013 to check on someone’s welfare.

 

Thanh Nguyen, a friend who stopped by the home Tuesday afternoon, described Lam as “a really nice guy,” but noted that “the family had trouble, problems.”

 

Neighbours say they had seen the couple arguing in the past. Moe Assiff said he saw the couple yelling outside the house at 3 a.m. in August.

Nguyen said Lam’s ex-wife owns a restaurant in Fort Saskatchewan.

 

 

Two hours after police found the bodies in north Edmonton, officers in Fort Saskatchewan spotted a black Mercedes SUV that was connected to the first killing. It was parked outside a Vietnamese restaurant called VN Express, which police also linked to the suicidal male from the north Edmonton homicides. On Tuesday, Knecht said that the man had a “business interest” in the restaurant but would not specify exactly what that means. “To what extent, that is also being investigated at this time,” said Knecht.

 

Suspecting the man was inside, police surrounded the restaurant and then rammed its entrance at 6:30 a.m., and commanded he come out.

 

Receiving no response, police entered the restaurant at 7:34 a.m. and found a dead man matching the description of the suicidal male. Investigators then shut down the downtown area for an hour as they collected evidence. At around 2:30 p.m. the medical examiner’s office arrived at the scene and the body was removed on a stretcher.

 

Edmonton police are remaining tight-lipped about their investigation. Knecht said twice on Tuesday that the situation was “fluid” and that officers that investigators are still trying to sort out the exact sequence of events, and how all of the victims and suspects are linked.

 

Knecht said the handgun used in all of the deaths was legally registered in B.C. in 1997, but was stolen in Surrey in 2006.

 

The scope and the scale of the carnage has stunned everyone from neighbours to Alberta Premier Jim Prentice.

 

“I wish to express my sorrow at the tragic incident which claimed lives in Edmonton and Fort Saskatchewan today,” Prentice said in a statement. “In this season of peace and goodwill, this act of violence is all the more difficult to comprehend.”

 

 

Edmonton Mayor Don Iveson released a statement Wednesday saying he was “shocked and saddened” about the homicides. “As more details have emerged, it now seems clear that this is a devastating case of domestic violence. The scale of these events is rare and exceptional. However, domestic violence remains all too common in our society and this tragedy is a harsh reminder of the continuing need for support for individuals and families in crisis, and the critical importance of reporting any instances of domestic violence to police.”

 

Amy Duong, the vice-president external of the Edmonton Viets Association, said the group did not know the victims. All are believed to be Vietnamese.

 

“It’s a tragic and horrific event,” Duong said. “I’ve never heard of this kind of domestic violence in the Vietnamese community before.”

 

Sonia Bitar is a former citizenship judge and the executive director of Changing Together, a local NGO that works to support immigrant women.

“It’s really a disaster,” she said. “It’s absolutely tragic, what happened. Can you imagine? In one day, eight people?”

 

Bitar said that police have released so little information about the victims and the circumstances, it’s hard to draw conclusions about what happened and why. But, she notes, the Christmas season can create serious financial stresses for many families. It can also be a harder time of the year for people to get support to cope with domestic tensions. Domestic violence is a problem in all kind of families, she said, but it can be particularly difficult for immigrant women who don’t speak fluent English, or who feel culturally isolated, to ask for assistance.

 

“Sometimes, it’s really embarrassing to call for help. For so many families, the violence is hidden or accepted, for the sake of the children.”

Near the crime scenes, residents expressed horror over the events.

 

When Farley Yuras moved into his home on 180A Avenue over two years ago, a boy who lived around the corner asked if he could take Yuras’s dog for a walk. Yuras is stunned now that the house was the scene of a mass murder.

 

“I’m just sort of disgusted and shocked,” he said. “It’s just really, really sad.”

 

Prior to the killings on Monday and Tuesday, there had been 27 homicides in Edmonton in 2014. These eight deaths bring the total to 35.

 

Knecht said autopsies will be performed on the suspect and seven victims from the north Edmonton home on Jan. 1.

 

Responding officers did an admirable job, the chief said.

“At this point it appears we did everything we could have at that time,” Knecht said.

 

With files from Ryan Cormier, Paula Simons, Madeline Smith, and Elise Stolte