A chilling image of a teenage gunman, grinning with a rifle, has surfaced, casting a haunting shadow over one of Canada’s deadliest mass shootings.
His mother, named by CTV News as Jennifer Strang, 39, and his 11-year-old stepbrother were killed (Image: Facebook)
Photos showing the teenage gunman behind one of Canada’s deadliest mass shootings have come to light, with one image capturing him grinning at the camera while gripping a rifle.
Jesse Van Rootselaar, 18, had been expelled from Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia before returning to carry out the attack. He died at the scene from a self-inflicted gunshot wound after killing six people inside the building.
The images were shared by his grandmother on Facebook to mark his 14th birthday in 2021.
“Happy 14th birthday to our grandson Jesse !! Love you always !! XOXO,” the post read.
In one deeply unsettling picture, Van Rootselaar sat beside a young child on a sofa, beaming at the camera with a rifle in his hands.
Mother and stepbrother killed first
His mother, named by CTV News as Jennifer Strang, 39, and his 11-year-old stepbrother were killed at a private address before he made his way to the school. Six further victims died inside Tumbler Ridge high school.
Approximately 25 people were wounded in total. Students and teachers who survived described hiding behind barricaded classroom doors for over two hours until law enforcement led them out of the building.
Transgender identity confirmed
Royal Canadian Mounted Police Deputy Commissioner Dwayne McDonald said Van Rootselaar was “born a biological male … who approximately six years ago began to transition to female, and identified as female.”
First responders who arrived at the scene had been told to look for a “female in a dress” after an initial active shooter alert described the gunman in those terms.
Van Rootselaar was no stranger to police. Officers had attended the family home repeatedly in previous years, each time over worries about his state of mind.
Weapons had previously been removed from the property, though the registered owner — unnamed by McDonald — went through legal channels to reclaim them.
Officers recovered a long gun and a modified handgun from the school premises, and questions remain over whether these were the same firearms that had been confiscated on the earlier occasion.
Van Rootselaar, 18, had been expelled from Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia (Image: Facebook)
One of Canada’s deadliest shootings
The death toll places the attack among the gravest in the country’s history.
Canada’s most notorious school massacre occurred in 1989, when 14 female students lost their lives at L’Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal.
In the wake of successive mass shootings, Canadian authorities have tightened firearms legislation considerably, with a recent widening of the ban covering weapons deemed to be assault-style guns.
