Suspect In Foiled Canadian Mall Shooting Left Social Media Trail

By Scott Neuman / NPR

Published February 15, 2015 at 9:59 AM PST

This story was published more than 9 years ago.

Police cars are seen outside the Halifax Shopping Centre, which was named by police as the intended target of an attack which they said was thwarted in Halifax, Nova Scotia on Saturday.

The young Canadian man who police say committed suicide as they closed in on him after a tip that he was involved in a mass shooting plot at a local shopping mall reportedly posted online images expressing admiration for the 1999 Columbine High School massacre.

Although police have yet to confirm his identity, Canadian media identifies the man as 19-year-old James Gamble. He and at least two others – Lindsay Kantha Souvannarath, 23, of Geneva, Ill., and Randall Steven Shepherd, 20, of Halifax, were reportedly part of the plot. A fourth suspect arrested on Saturday was subsequently released.

The CBC says: "Souvannarath was arrested at the Halifax Stanfield International Airport after arriving in Canada early Friday, at around 2 a.m. Shepherd, who was there to meet her, was also arrested."

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As we reported on Saturday, police believe that the plot, which they say the co-conspirators discussed online, "would have been devastating."

The CBC reports: "Police tracked down a 19-year-old to a home on Friday on Tiger Maple Drive in Timberlea, about 20 minutes outside Halifax. Authorities initially thought he may have been linked to the alleged plot. He was found dead early Friday, and his death is under investigation by Nova Scotia's Serious Incident Response Team."

Maclean's magazine says that a social networking website believed linked to Gamble "features pictures of weapons, Nazi symbols and images relating to the Columbine school shooting. Other pictures on the social media site show the young man posing with a rifle and a knife."

The Canadian weekly reports that on Feb. 5 "an image circulated on another account featuring the 19-year-old's username and the phrase: 'Valentine's Day it's going down.'"

The Halifax Chronicle Herald quotes neighbor Cindy Greenwood as saying the family attended the local Seventh Day Adventist Church.

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"This is really shocking. ... The parents are good people. They attend church. It's a nice family. I'm not sure what they even know of this so far," Greenwood told the newspaper.