Female suspect identified in Canada's worst school shooting in decades with 9 dead
William Morgan
Featured Image Credit: Eagle Vision Agency / AFP via Getty Images
A suspect has been identified in the wake of the horrific mass shooting in western Canada that claimed the lives of nine people and left over two dozen injured.
Police have identified 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar as the suspect in what is one of Canada's worst cases of gun violence in decades, in the small community of Tumbler Ridge in British Columbia.
Van Rootselaar was said to have identified as female after transitioning around six years ago, according to Dwayne McDonald, deputy commissioner of the local Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).
McDonald said that officers arrived at the scene within two minutes of a 911 call being made, arriving to active gunfire but finding Van Rootselaar dead shortly after.
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The RCMP commissioner revealed further grim details of the horrific mass killing on Wednesday, detailing that an adult woman and boy found dead at a residential address were the suspect's mother, 39, and stepbrother, 11.
McDonald said at a press conference: “Police had attended that residence on a number of occasions over the last several years dealing with concerns of mental health with our suspect.”
The most recent visit to the home was in spring 2025 and, on one of these 'occasions', officers had seized firearms at the address. He also added that Van Rootselaar had previously held a gun license, but it had expired in 2024 and that she had no weapons registered in her name.
The deputy commissioner also gave some insight into the terrifying attack carried out at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, where seven people, including the shooter, were found dead.
Detectives believe that the suspect began their violent spree at their home before going to the school
25 people were also injured during the school shooting, a handful of whom remain critically injured.
RCMP initially stated that 10 people had been killed in the Tumbler Ridge shooting, but later revised the number down to nine.
Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney, looking visibly shaken by the shooting, told the country's parliament: "Tumbler Ridge … is one of the youngest towns in the great province of British Columbia, carved out of the wilderness in the 1980s, built on the promise of the resource economy and by the determination of its residents.
"It’s a town of miners, teachers, construction workers, families who have built their lives there, people who have always shown up for each other there."
He added to his fellow Canadians: "We will get through this. We will learn from this."