Bystanders Could Have Been Shot by Police at Caribbean Festival

A shootout between police and two robbery suspects might have sent two innocent bystanders to hospital with gunshot wounds.

Postmedia's Christie Blatchford suggests that “it is probable” that two people taken to hospital with gunshot injuries during Toronto's Caribbean Carnival were innocent bystanders accidentally shot by police bullets. A shootout erupted along the parade route on Saturday after police apparently confronted two men who were mugging and pickpocketing people in the crowd of thousands along Lakeshore Boulevard. Blatchford's recreation of the scene leads her to conclude that one of the suspects drew a gun and loosed off a few rounds into the air when a bystander tried to film him. The shots attracted the attention of police, who then pursued the suspects. One of the men was shot and killed, although some of the shots fired by police could have richocheted and struck the two hospitalized bystanders. Ontario's civilian Special Investigations Unit is looking into the case but has yet to comment publicly on the events.