Suspect in Cirque du Soleil crash was having ‘religious delusions,' Vancouver police say
The suspect who allegedly crashed a car into an East Vancouver venue during a Cirque du Soleil performance Thursday evening was apparently experiencing 'religious delusions,' according to police.
The vehicle slammed into the entrance of Pacific Coliseum around 8 p.m., approximately one hour after the crowded show began.
The Vancouver Police Department said the suspected driver, a 30-year-old local man, was arrested at the scene and has since been certified under B.C.'s Mental Health Act, which allows for involuntary treatment.
'We trust that he's getting the care that he needs,' Sgt. Steve Addison told reporters Friday at a news conference.
The suspect's name has not been publicized as he has not been criminally charged.
Suspect was 'talking about Satan'
Addison said the individual does not have a criminal record or any history of police interactions related to his mental health, but it was 'apparent' he was in crisis when officers arrived at the scene Thursday.
'He was speaking and acting erratically,' Addison said. 'Talking about Satan, talking about God, saying other things that made it very obvious he was experiencing a mental health crisis.'
Authorities have not confirmed how fast the car was travelling when it crashed into Pacific Coliseum, but said it was moving at a significant speed.
No one was injured – but Addison said the outcome could have been much worse if the vehicle had not struck a concrete column that prevented it from fully entering the venue.
Witness Mike Roberts told CTV News he was at the Cirque du Soleil performance when he heard a loud bang, which he initially assumed was part of the act.
He said he got up to investigate after seeing 'a small piece of the vehicle' had landed near his seat.
'Went behind the curtains and from there saw the car that was sitting inside, or partially inside the Coliseum doors,' he said.
Pacific Coliseum crash
Emergency crews respond after a car crashed into the entrance of Pacific Coliseum in East Vancouver on June 5, 2025.
Incident reignites safety concerns
Thursday's incident came 41 days after the Lapu-Lapu Day vehicle attack that left 11 people dead and dozens of others injured – and while the circumstances are different, Addison said 'some of the similarities' have understandably reignited safety concerns in the city.
Those are even more pressing ahead of a weekend marked by a number of large-scale events in Vancouver, including the B.C. Lions home opener and Italian Day on the Drive.
Police confirmed there will be mobile road barriers set up at both events, and that 300 extra officers will be deployed between Friday and Sunday to ensure public safety.
'We will have a high-visibility presence throughout the city in a variety of events,' Addison said. 'We're doing this to provide comfort and assurance to people, to deter crime, and to respond if something happens.'
Heading into summer, with more massive events such as Pride and the Celebration of Light, the Vancouver Police Department will continue working with the organizers and city staff to 'do everything that we can' to keep the public safe, Addison said.
'We can't cage this city up, we can't bubble-wrap people,' he said. 'It's not reasonable or practical to put a police officer on every corner, and people don't want to see that. We can only worry about the things that we can control as a police agency.'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Globe and Mail
an hour ago
- Globe and Mail
Scammers are impersonating finance experts to steal millions – and the real ones are struggling to stop it
Last week, Bank of Montreal chief investment strategist Brian Belski became the latest finance heavyweight to warn his social-media followers about imposters posing as him to scam investors. Mr. Belski alluded to bogus Instagram and Facebook ads under the account name 'BMO Belski,' which sought to lure users to investment groups on WhatsApp through AI-generated videos and other content. 'To be clear: I only post from this official LinkedIn account and do not engage on other social platforms,' the real Mr. Belski wrote on LinkedIn. To those who've seen the hyper-realistic videos purporting to show Mr. Belski turning his head from side to side, promising to 'share three stock picks and the latest market insights every day' with his WhatsApp community, this may have come as a surprise. While scams impersonating celebrities and politicians have proliferated for years, fraud targeting investors through fake advice from big names in finance is now multiplying, with the real experts struggling to get the content taken down. Law enforcement, legal experts and social-media giants are split on who should take the blame. Last week, prominent Bay Street economist David Rosenberg spoke out about a scam that used his identity, telling The Globe and Mail that several investors reported collective losses to his firm exceeding $1-million. Victims were lured to WhatsApp groups recommending stocks that swung dramatically in price, creating the illusion of quick profits. Once investors put in more money, the stocks' prices plummeted. Mr. Rosenberg and his firm reported the scam to both Meta Platforms Inc. and the police but eventually went public after the ads continued to circulate for months. David Rosenberg says investment scam using his name bilked victims out of hundreds of thousands of dollars Meta spokesperson Julia Perreira said the content of those ads violated the company's policies and it removes scam ads when detected. In March, Financial Times economics commentator Martin Wolf and his colleagues played 'whack-a-mole' with Meta, trying to take down deepfakes of him giving investment advice. 'The voice didn't sound fully like me,' Mr. Wolf said in an interview, adding that his avatar did look convincing otherwise. Data from Meta's Ad Library seen by Mr. Wolf and his colleagues revealed that the ad reached nearly one million users by the end of April in the EU alone. Roughly 960,000 were reached after the Financial Times first notified Meta about the deepfakes. In Canada, net losses from investment scams where the initial contact was on social media have risen 95 per cent since 2021, reaching $128.4-million last year, according to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre. Meanwhile, the number of reported victims has fluctuated, suggesting that the scams are becoming more ambitious in how much money they steal. 'Fraud is not only becoming more common, it's becoming more convincing,' said Detective David Coffey of the Toronto Police Service's Financial Crimes Unit. 'That is really what we're seeing with AI – they're scraping the internet for these legitimate businesses and they're utilizing them to commit their own frauds.' People may also be losing more money to imposter scams because it's become difficult to grow investments the traditional way, said Tanya Walker, managing partner at Walker Law, who specializes in fraud litigation. 'Thirty years ago, interest rates could have been 16 per cent,' she said. 'For quite some time, our interest rates have been low.' She said investors may think to themselves, ' 'Why am I going to invest in a GIC with the bank at 3-per-cent interest when I could get 14 or 15 per cent?' ' Who should be held accountable for these scams is a divisive question. 'Once it gets to be a police report, it's too late,' Det. Coffey said. Most investment scams targeting Canadians are orchestrated from outside the country and across regions where local officials are not friendly to Canadian law enforcement, he said. But Kenneth Jull, partner at Gardiner Roberts LLP, specializing in financial crimes and corporate compliance, said relying on social-media companies to police their clients is both logistically and legally challenging. 'They wouldn't have the resources to do it, even if they wanted to,' he said. Under Canadian law – and similarly in the United States – social platforms have limited legal liability for users' content based on the safe harbour principle, said Mark Lokanan, a professor at Royal Roads University specializing in AI-driven financial-crime investigations. 'They are not liable as long as they do not actively curate, endorse or participate in the scam.' But the law does hold tech giants responsible when there's credible notice and willful blindness, Mr. Jull said. The case of YesUp eCommerce set a precedent. It was the first Canadian case where a server company was convicted for child pornography because of willful blindness, Mr. Jull said. In that case, YesUp was warned more than 200 times about illegal content. However, Prof. Lokanan said the burden of proof can make legal action difficult. Det. Coffey said Canada has fallen behind global peers on prevention and apprehension of imposter scams. Australia has created a national fraud-fighting agency and brought social-media and telecom companies into the fold. Australia's reported scam losses fell by almost 26 per cent in 2024 from the previous year, according to official statistics. But Mr. Jull said Canadian law enforcement can do more to work with foreign officials to apprehend perpetrators, citing the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act and its enforcement as an example. 'We don't sit back and say, 'Well, it's Russia, nothing we can do,'' he said. But Mr. Wolf's case suggests that as much as Meta may be facilitating the problem, it might be in the best position to help solve it. Shortly before Mr. Wolf published his column on the experience, Meta enrolled him in a new program that uses facial recognition to compare legitimate images of public figures against potential scam content. 'Nobody has been bringing the scam to my attention since,' Mr. Wolf said.
CTV News
an hour ago
- CTV News
Suspect wanted in connection with fatal Toronto stabbing arrested: police
Police have arrested and charged the suspect wanted in connection with the fatal stabbing of a 35-year-old man in the city's east end last week. Anthony Steven Oliveira, 24, of no fixed address, was arrested and charged with one count of first-degree murder, police say. Officers with the Niagara Regional Police Service located and arrested Oliveira near Falls Ave. and Clifton Hill in Niagara Falls on Sunday. The stabbing occurred behind a plaza near Hillingdon and Danforth Avenues, east of Coxwell Avenue, on June 17 around 11 p.m. Officers found the victim, Ashkan Pournasir-Roudbane, suffering from multiple stab wounds after an alleged altercation between two men. He was rushed to hospital, where he died shortly after. Pournasir-Roudbane was Toronto's 16th homicide victim of 2025. Oliveira has a history of violence and was also wanted by Durham police in connection with an alleged attempted stabbing in Oshawa on June 1. He was scheduled to appear in court Sunday afternoon. Anyone with information is asked to contact police or Crime Stoppers anonymously.
CTV News
an hour ago
- CTV News
‘It's day by day': Nova Scotia teenager struck by vehicle recovering in hospital
Kristen Mills, 15, seen in this undated photo, was struck by a vehicle in Pictou Landing First Nation on June 18. (Submitted) A Nova Scotia teenager is recovering in hospital after being struck by a vehicle last week. Kristen Mills, 15, was walking home from a Pride event in Pictou Landing First Nation around 4:30 p.m. on June 18 when she was hit by the vehicle on Beach Road. 'She was with her cousins and they parted ways at the intersection, and she went right to go home, and the other two cousins went left,' said Kristen's godmother Kara Boyles. While Boyles was not there when it happened, she said she was told a vehicle had stopped to let Kristen cross, but another kept going. 'The driver that hit her, I don't know if he didn't see her or what,' she said. 'I don't know why he didn't see her.' Nova Scotia RCMP confirmed officers, EHS and fire services were called to the scene that day. 'Responding officers learned a Hyundai Elantra struck a youth who was crossing the road,' said police in an email to CTV News. The driver, a 69-year-old man, was not injured. Police said the investigation is ongoing and no charges have been laid at this time. While RCMP said her injuries were non-life-threatening, Boyles said she broke her spine in two places – one in her neck and the other in her lower back. 'They were clean breaks, I guess,' said Boyles. 'She doesn't need surgery.' 'Currency for Krissy' Kristen was rushed to hospital following the collision and has been recovering in Halifax at the IWK Health Centre. At this point, it's not clear how long she'll be there. 'It's day by day. She can't go home until she can be up on her own and she cannot. She's in so much pain that it just hurts too much to be up,' said Boyles. While Kristen is in hospital, her parents have been by her side, while her other two siblings are back in their community. It's been a challenging time for the family, as Pictou Landing First Nation is about 170 kilometres northeast of Halifax. 'It's rough. Everybody's affected – the whole community really. Her little brother is worried about her and her big sister, obviously, and family like her mom and dad,' said Boyles. 'This is a big impact because now they're not working, and you have two other kids at home.' Currency for Kristen The Pictou Landing First Nation Fire Department and Fishery Department held a boot drive Friday, June 20, 2025 to raise funds for Kristen Mills, who is recovering in hospital after being struck by a vehicle. (Source: Facebook/Pictou Landing First Nation) To help with expenses, the Fishery Department along with the Pictou Landing First Nation Fire Department have been fundraising for the family. They're hosting a boot drive called 'Currency for Krissy.' 'They set up on either end of the community because we have two entry points, and we were just asking for donations for help for the family. You know, the hospital stays away in the city are quite expensive, and they're unable to work.' Since the incident, Boyles has been keeping her goddaughter in her thoughts. 'She's young. She has a whole life ahead of her, right? This event is already going to affect her for probably the rest of her life.' Urging caution On the afternoon of the collision, Pictou Landing First Nation Chief Tamara Young urged people to drive with care. 'As a small community, we cannot stress enough the importance of driving slowly and being mindful of our children. Their safety depends on all of us,' she said in a Facebook post. Young said the community will be getting a crosswalk in response to a recent study showing an increase in traffic going through the community. 'We are still pushing for another crosswalk, specifically at that intersection of Beach/Birch,' she said. She said pylons were also placed on the main road to get traffic to slow down. For more Nova Scotia news, visit our dedicated provincial page
