With police at school, Vancouver Jewish community marks Oct. 7 with sadness, unease

VANCOUVER – Police in Vancouver say a man has been arrested after setting fire to a van filled with containers of gasoline outside City Hall.

They say in a post to social media that Vancouver Fire Rescue extinguished the blaze Sunday night and found about 100 litres of unburned gasoline in canisters inside the car.

Fire department information officer Matthew Trudeau says several people reported the incident and firefighters were deployed around 5:15 p.m.

He says six fire trucks were sent to the fire — which was soon deemed incendiary — and crews remained on scene for about two hours.

Police closed West 12th Avenue between Cambie and Yukon for their arson investigation, but it had been reopened by Monday morning.

They say in Sunday night’s social media post that a man was arrested and no one was hurt.

It says the suspect appears to have acted alone and the incident is isolated but his motivation is currently unknown.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 7, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Lawyers for a man accused of selling poison online to people who later used it to take their own lives are seeking to intervene in an application to Canada’s top court that they argue could affect his criminal case.

The legal team representing Kenneth Law has filed a motion for leave to intervene after prosecutors asked the Supreme Court of Canada to urgently review a recent Ontario ruling in a different case that could undermine the murder charges against him.

Law faces 14 counts each of first-degree murder and aiding suicide in a case scheduled to go to trial next September. He’s expected to plead not guilty.

In their application filed last month, lawyers writing for the Attorney General of Ontario pointed to Law’s impending trial as a reason for the Supreme Court to consider an expedited review of a ruling delivered by the province’s top court in June.

That ruling suggests a person may only be liable for murder if they provided a person who committed suicide with the lethal substance and “overbore the victim’s freewill in choosing suicide.”

Law’s lawyers argue in their motion that the Criminal Code distinguishes between homicide and assisting suicide.

“Mr. Law is not alleged to have been present at any of the deaths,” they wrote in the document.

“It would impermissibly warp the language of the Criminal Code to assert that someone who provides a toxic substance that another person later voluntarily consumes in another location has ‘actually committed’ their murder.”

They further argue their client has “a direct stake” in the Crown’s application, “as he may be adversely affected by this court’s decision.”

Crown lawyers have argued that the standard set in the Ontario ruling shifts focus from the accused’s actions to the victim’s intent, which may be unknowable in cases where the victim dies.

Police have said all charges against Law relate to the same 14 people, who were between the ages of 16 and 36 and died in communities across Ontario.

Investigators have alleged that Law ran several websites that were used to sell sodium nitrite and other items that can be used for self-harm, shipping them to people in more than 40 countries.

If you or someone you know is thinking about suicide, support is available 24/7 by calling or texting 988, Canada’s national suicide prevention helpline.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 7, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

VANCOUVER – The First Nations Health Authority in British Columbia says online hackers gained access to an array of personal information including medical test results and insurance claims during a cybersecurity breach last May.

The health authority says it has concluded its investigation and “the impact of the cybersecurity incident is not the same for everyone.”

But in general, it says hackers gained access to information such as first and last names, home addresses, email addresses, personal health numbers, insurance claim details, and tuberculosis screening test results for certain people.

A statement from the health authority says it hired third-party cybersecurity experts to help with the investigation, which found people whose personal information may have been affected included any First Nations person with a Certificate of Indian Status card who lived or recently lived in B.C. at the time of the breach.

The statement says the health authority was able to detect and disrupt the cybersecurity breach while it was in progress, limiting its impact.

The previously disclosed attack came amid a spate of cybersecurity incidents in B.C. that hit targets including the provincial government, B.C. Libraries and the retailer London Drugs.

First Nations Health Authority CEO Richard Jock says cybersecurity continues to be a top priority for the health authority as the threats become more persistent and sophisticated.

Those with compromised information may also include First Nations individuals and immediate non-First Nations family members who lived in B.C. First Nations communities and had a tuberculosis screening test before March 29, 2016.

The health authority says it will offer supports, such as a two-year subscription to a credit monitoring service, to everyone whose status card number was affected.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 7, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.