Reports say multiple people have been injured after shots were fired in the area of Danforth and Logan avenues in Toronto, Canada.
A black-clad gunman opened fire in a busy neighborhood of Toronto last night (Sunday), killing at least two people and wounding 12 others before being fatally shot in an "exchange of gunfire" with police, authorities said.
The motive for the shootings was not immediately clear, and the identity of the suspected gunman has not been made public. But Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders said that it was not a random act and that terrorism had not been ruled out.
Video posted on the Internet included the sounds of gunshots echoing off the buildings in an area of restaurants and shops known as Greektown.
A spokeswoman for Ontario's Special Investigations Unit, Monica Hudon, said two people were killed along with the suspect. Earlier, Saunders said a woman was killed and a girl was in critical condition. But details on the second victim were not immediately known.
The gunfire erupted around 10 p.m. Sunday near Danforth and Logan avenues east of downtown in the Danforth neighborhood, police tweeted. Saunders described the stretch of roadway as "one of the busiest streets in the country."
"If anybody saw anything at any time, here at Danforth and Logan, if they could please contact the police," Saunders said.
Civilians are escorted from the scene of a shooting in Toronto yesterday. Photo / AP
Video reportedly taken at the scene captured the sound of gunfire as pedestrians ducked into nearby buildings.
The attack shattered an otherwise peaceful night in Greektown, a name stemming from the inhabitants who filled the neighborhood following World War II.
A mix of restaurants, the area is the scene of the popular Taste of the Danforth festival, a yearly three-day food and entertainment event in August that pulls in more than 1.5 million visitors, according to its website. The cultural melting pot featured at the festival - which includes Chinese, South Asian, Egyptian, Greek, Japanese and Azerbaijani dancing - reflects the eclectic blend of the neighborhood.
"For non-Toronto folk: Danforth/Pape is one of those lively, bustling residential areas with tons of families out on summer nights," columnist Robyn Urback wrote on Twitter after the shooting, referring to Pape Avenue, another street in the area. "This is horrific."
Andrew Van Eek, who lives near the shooting, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. that he stuck his head out of his window after the gunfire started.
"There was a lot of commotion in the street," he told the CBC. "I saw somebody come just down the sidewalk and shoot into Demetres restaurant."
Van Eek told the network that the suspect was a white man, dressed in black, who appeared to be in his early 30s.
Plainclothes police officers work the scene of a shooting in Toronto yesterday. Photo / AP
Another witness told CTV that he estimated the gunman fired about 20 shots.
"And then, I saw the carnage as I ran down the street here to kind of follow the gunfire," he told the station. "I saw at least four people shot."
Jody Steinhauer was strolling into a restaurant last night with her partner, two sets of grandparents and her children. It was her birthday celebration, she told Radio New Zealand. But when the party was entering the establishment, they suddenly heard a series of cracks like firecrackers. Restaurant staff ordered everyone to the back of the room. Get down, they said.
"All you could hear was screaming," Steinhauer recalled. "There was a woman coming in off the street yelling, 'Help me! Help me!' She had been shot in the leg."
The woman was taken into the back of the room and stabilized on a bench. "Thank goodness there was a doctor in the restaurant," she said.
Steinhauer ducked into a corner and began firing off tweets about what was happening. "We couldn't even get through to the emergency 911 numbers because the circuits were so jammed," she said. "I was able to tweet out to reporters to let them know what was going on."
The gunman was killed four doors down from where Steinhauer and her family were hiding, she said.
"It's just terrifying," she said. "Toronto is a very safe city, with a lot of people from a lot of cultures. But who knows what really happened. Time will tell."
It has been a violent year for Toronto. In April, 25-year-old Alek Minassian allegedly mowed down pedestrians in a shopping district with a van, leaving 10 dead and dozens injured. Minassian is facing 10 counts of first-degree murder.
Police work the scene of a shooting in Toronto. Photo / AP
But the latest deadly shooting also comes as Toronto has witnessed an increase in gun violence over the recent summer months. Eleven people were shot in a span of seven days at the end of June, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported. As of July 16, the city has seen 220 shootings in 2018, police department statistics show. Gun-related fatalities this year are up 50 percent from 2017, according to the BBC.
The violent spike has sparked considerable public outcry. In response to the pressure, the city launched a $15 million "gun violence reduction plan" last week. The proposal has put an additional 200 police officers on Toronto streets in targeted areas between 7 p.m. and 3 a.m. for the remainder of the summer.
In his brief comments Monday morning, Tory, the Toronto mayor, reiterated that the Danforth shooting was "evidence of a gun problem" in the city.
"Guns are too readily available to too many people," Tory said.
