A man carrying a firearm was reportedly shot and killed by officers in a residential area of Toronto.
Several schools in Toronto, Canada, were put on lockdown after police shot and killed a man who was allegedly carrying a firearm in public. Authorities have offered few details about the deadly incident, which follows two mass shootings in the United States in recent days.
Toronto police responded to “reports of a man carrying a firearm” around 1:30 p.m. local time Thursday, Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU) said in a news release, adding only that there was a “interaction” between two officers and the man before they opened fire, killing him on the spot.
It is not clear what caused the shooting. Although local officials said a long-barreled firearm was found at the scene, they added that it was too early to say whether the man was brandishing the weapon when he was shot and that an investigation is ongoing.
Some media reports suggested the suspect was aged “in his late teens or early 20s”, and that witnesses heard three shots before seeing police try to revive the man.
The shooting prompted multi-level closures at at least five local schools, police said. A spokesperson for the Toronto school board noted that the closest school to the scene did not appear to be related to the incident, and the board announced that the closures were lifted after about two hours.
Commenting during a news conference later that day, Toronto Police Chief James Ramer referenced two mass shootings in the US this month, saying “Because of the proximity to a school, I certainly understand the trauma and how traumatic it must have been for staff, students and parents given the two recent events that have occurred in the United States.”
Two days earlier, an armed teenager entered a Texas elementary school and killed 19 children and two adults, while another mass shooter in Buffalo, New York, left 10 dead in a supermarket earlier this month.
Ramer did not elaborate on the details of the case and said he is “forbidden” to share the findings of provincial investigators, and finally addressed reporters for only about 10 minutes. He noted that the incident was “isolated” and that there was no continuing threat to the public, however.