Vancouver Canadian Tire reopens after stabbing and shooting

UPDATE: The BC Coroners Service has confirmed the identity of the suspect as Daniel Peter Rintoul, aged 38, of Vancouver.

A Canadian Tire in East Vancouver that was the scene of a shooting and stabbing reopened its doors for the first time after the incident on Thursday.

But customers who were waiting to enter the store said they were still rattled by the incident in which a 38-year-old man allegedly stabbed a store clerk before trying to steal firearms from a gun cabinet. He left the store minutes later, holding an 82-year-old man hostage.

Police rescued the senior, and tasered and shot the suspect with rubber bullets. But, after he allegedly stabbed one of the officers, he was killed by police.

READ MORE: Suspect allegedly stabbed two, took elderly man hostage in Canadian tire rampage

“I think everything is just getting worse. You know, a lot of people, they just lost their jobs. They’re on the street,” one customer said.

SFU criminology professor Robert Gordon linked the incident to two other recent crimes by pointing out that the suspect is from Alberta.

Similarly, 21-year-old Gabriel Klein, the suspect in a stabbing attack at an Abbotsford Secondary School on Nov. 1 that killed 13-year-old Letisha Reimer and seriously injured her friend, is from Alberta. Two of the five suspects in a Vancouver marijuana shop robbery in October are also from B.C.’s Eastern neighbour.

READ MORE: Did the Abbotsford stabbing suspect fall through the cracks of our mental health system? 

“People who have been employed in Alberta suddenly find themselves unemployed and when they get desperate, they engage in crimes for survival,” Gordon said.

Vancouver Police Sgt. Brian Montague highlighted similar concerns.

“I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that the Alberta economy is so poor right now and, as a result, we are likely going to run into individuals that are recently moved here that are committing crimes as well,” Montague said.