Calgary’s Worst Mass Murder

A few weeks ago, Calgary broke a new city record.  It broke the record for the most number of mass murders at once, five. 

            Summary:  On April 15^th 2014 at around 2:00am in the morning, police were called to a residence in Brentwood where a stabbing was taking place.  Five victims died in the incident:  Lawrence Hong, 27 - Josh Hunter, 23 - Zackariah Rathwell, 23 - Jordan Segura, 23 - Kaiti Perras, 23.  The accused Matthew de Grood, 22 fled the scene and was taken into custody not long after.

Here is a video link to the story:

 Although I’ve had a lot of thoughts in my head, I’ve been having a hard time putting them into words because of the mixed emotions I’ve been experiencing.  I’m feeling sad for the perpetrator and his victims.  Death like this affects families, friends, communities, strangers, and the world.  I’m feeling confused like most are because all of the students including the perpetrator involved were good kids who never had any history with the law.  Some were university students and even the perpetrator was bound for law school in the fall of 2014 at the University of Calgary.  I know I will be thinking about him when I start my graduate studies because the Faculty of Law is in the same building as us.  I tried to hold back tears when the father of Mathew de Grood, a retired police officer of 33 years released a statement to the press stating how sorry he was for the tragedy that has affected families and how confused they were as parents that their son was responsible for such a horrible crime.  Please watch the link below:

I’m feeling angry about the comments I read online about others who talk about mental illness and the misconceptions about mental illness.  I think I’m bothered by what people say because although I’ve never been diagnosed with a mental illness I can relate to that uncontrollable part of schizophrenia.  I think this explanation requires a little bit of personal history about me.  When I was younger in junior high and high school, I struggled in school a lot academically and socially.  I wasn’t having a good time in school and things were not going my way.  I learned to day dream and would do it constantly during classes.  It got to the point where I was scared because I couldn’t tell (the things I fantasized) what was real and what was fantasy anymore.  I would fantasize and talk to myself a lot and so as I grew up sometimes voices inside and outside of myself became normal.  When I got to Mount Royal, I began to learn things I enjoyed and stopped day dreaming a lot.  I would still have a hard time focusing but it was a lot less.  I still self-talked but it was always in private and it was still normal to me.  I learned in psychology that this was normal too so didn’t think anything of it.  But at some point the voices started to become very negative and I had to constantly tell the voices to go away out loud.  It scared me when I realized that these were not my own thoughts anymore but someone else’s thoughts.  When I heard these voices, I tried to distinguish whether they were my own or someone else’s.  I realized that these were not my voices and at some point told my oldest sister.  My oldest sister told me that mental illness emerges around the age that I was at.  What were the voices saying?  The voices were calling me names, bad names.  The voices told me to kill my mom.  I remember my mom had done something and at our New Brighton house walking down the stairs right away voices in my head said “kill her” and I told them “I don’t want to kill her”.  I was scared.  I’m not sure when it stopped.  I just know now that I’m at peace now and feel in control of myself.

A lot of people blame mental health for things that cannot be explained.  For instance in this case, the perpetrator was described as being “shy” and “quiet” and “a good kid”.  Some people are mad that he will get off easy.  Here are some comments from Global Calgary on Facebook:

Some say that mental illness is not an excuse for the crime that he has committed -

Rach Cowley:  “mental or not, noone has the right to kill another individual or more. There is a lot of mental people out there, but its up to the parent or companion to find out the signs of this sickness and to put them away. Mental people don't kill, only disruptive people who have hard dark secrets hidden”.

Shannon Lanz Na: “there isn't no turning back you kill 5 peoole it don't matter! People can't always have excuses this is why people think they can kill and get away with it cause people are all about mental illness like come on those poor familys are suffering casue of some illness Sick!!!! Im sure your outlook on the whole thing would be different if it was your childs life that was taken by some random guy!!! Stop the excuses he needs to be laid to rest!”

Tracey Brown: “He's going to school to be a psych major and a lawyer he must of been aware if what will happen to him if he decided to kill 5 kids ....makes me sick to my stomach lock him up throw away the key...my heart goes out to all the families involved”

Some try to shed light about mental illness like schizophrenia -

Tamara Dolenuck Laschinsky:  “If you had schizophrenia you'd feel differently. You can't control what you hear, see or think. The visions are real and your reality is skewed. Only medication curbs it. Once DeGrood comes back to reality he'll have to live with what he's done. Though I think he should forever remain imprisoned in at least a mental facility doing volunteer work. He can never be reintroduced to society for his safety and the publics safety if he ever goes off medication. A cure needs to be found because it's an illness that is not 'cureable' and strikes anyone, anytime”.

Sandi Newby-Grocock: That sure is lumping all schizophrenics into one mold. Do you realize how many people you interact with in a daily basis that could be schizophrenic and/or controlled on meds? Do you realize there are approx 100 different types of schizophrenia? To say every one of them should not live on their own and be institutionalized is just unrealistic.

Jody Dunn: “How ignorant most people are about mental illness. By ignorant I mean unknowing.  Schizophrenia only presents itself around this young mans age.  He and his family had no idea what was and is happening to him.  God forbid it be any of the ignorant to experience such tragedy.  My heart goes out to this young man and his family.  The victims also.. Very much so”.

I stopped myself from reading comments on Facebook a while ago because I was so angry about what others were saying.   I just wanted to understand how I was feeling in the moment and that was good enough for me.  I’m surprised by how these deaths have affected me as I didn’t know any of the people involved.  I know a friend from school who was a friend of one of the victims but that’s about it.  I think perhaps because there are so many unexplained questions in this case.  I thought once if the victims or perpetrators were drug dealers, in gangs, known criminals in Calgary, bullies, or involved in other crimes that this story might be an after-thought and easier to bare.  But because these were clean and academically driven kids with bright future ahead of them that it made it that much more difficult to comprehend.  There are just so many connections to me that I make with myself.  The perpetrator is part of the Asian community; some of the students go to University of Calgary, and these kids are around my age.  I think what it boils down to is that, it could have been me.

            You would never know that I might be borderline autistic would you?  My classmates and family always describes me as smart but smart has nothing to do with mental illness or autism.  I try my best you know to educate others about the misconception about mental illness but I realize although I may know more than the next person on the street that I know very little about how schizophrenia affects others.  I know people around me assume that I should know these things.

            As a social worker, there are so many things that people assume about us.  Even my mom the other day as I was in an argument with her said, “You’re a social worker.  You should understand how I feel”.  The injustice you know, that assumption that because I am a social worker that I should put my own feelings aside and understand from her point of view.  I am constantly learning and this tragedy that has been bestowed upon Calgary really made me see what the general perception about mental illness others had and my own feelings towards mental illness.  I think we shouldn’t be quick to judge others before we know the whole story.  Mental illness is something that others should educate themselves about because it affects more people then they think.