A hit-and-run incident Monday in Quebec, Canada is being termed a potential terrorist attack tonight, after it was revealed that the driver was being tracked by police as someone with potential terrorist links, and had become “radicalized” online.
25-year-old Martin Couture-Rouleau ran over two Canadian and sped off, before being forced off the road by police in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, just southeast of Montreal. One of the soldiers later died of his injuries.
Canadian officials say Couture-Rouleau was calling himself Ahmed LeConverti online, and had been the subject of ongoing tracking as one of 90 Canadians with potential terror links.
It wasn’t just an idle watchlist, either, as Couture-Rouleau had his passport seized by the Canadian police back in July, when he tried to travel to Turkey. He was never charged with a crime in the incident.
Police had met with him several times in the past, and also met with his parents and the imam at the mosque he was visiting, trying to get them to help convince him not to try to go abroad to join a jihadist group.
Though some are criticizing the police for not being more aggressive with Couture-Rouleau, officials say it would’ve been hard to do anymore than they can because there was no proof of any plot until after the attack happened, and he worked alone.
Watching the RCMP new conference for this emphasizes the differences in police attitudes in Canada. The spokesperson repeatedly pointed out "it is not a crime to think bad things" etc. The "lock em up" news media was having trouble trying to persuade the police that the should have "done something". Police as investigators, and the Crown as prosecutor; what a novel idea compared to the more pleasing "judge, jury, executioner" SWAT approach.
In the end it turned out badly but this is what happens when the police actually respect the law. A collective risk.
"what a novel idea compared to the… SWAT approach."
Really? The police *did* shoot and kill the Evildoer – so how is that not the SWAT approach? According to CBC, the police determined he was an Evildoer by reading his Facebook pages – just like they do in the good ole USA.
You can say the Canadians are somehow different or better than the US Dear Leaders, but in the end, they are vassals of the Empire and mostly do what they are told.
But the shooting and killing was not done based on precrime's say-so.
Marc, as a Canadian tax slave victim I'm with you on the "differences in police attitudes in Canada.". From here it appears that they're far less aggressive than the same tax eaters down south (for now). I think that's because the drug laws here are far less draconian. But they did take passports away from the 2 individual perpetrators – something they absolutely had no right to do. And something the US and UK are apparently not doing.