Families in Ontario grieve with Buffalo, N.Y., after 'heartbreaking' mass shooting
CBC
Sherri Darlene says her father Robert Ford visits Tops supermarket in Buffalo, N.Y., nearly every day, just to pickup "little things." It happens so often that it's become a bit of a family joke.
The 74-year-old was on his way there Saturday when he stopped to see if his friend Larry wanted to join him, according to his daughter, who lives across the border in Niagara Falls, Ont.
Darlene said her phone started ringing around the same time, with people telling her there had been a mass shooting in the city she was born in and she should check in with her loved ones.
"My heart just dropped and I immediately called my father," said Darlene.
Ford told her what had happened.
"We got to talking on the porch and the next thing you know we heard sirens," she recalled he father saying.
He came "that close," to being there at the same time, she said during a video interview with CBC Sunday morning, holding her fingers just an inch apart. "That close."
Officials say a white 18-year-old wearing military gear and livestreaming with a helmet camera opened fire with a rifle at a supermarket in Buffalo, killing 10 people and wounding three others Saturday in what authorities described as "racially motivated violent extremism."
Police said he shot 11 Black victims and two white victims before surrendering to authorities in a rampage he broadcast live on the streaming platform Twitch.
Darlene has family who live in the neighbourhood where the shooting happened and described the supermarket as the "Blackest Tops in Buffalo." On a Saturday afternoon it would have been crowded with shoppers, especially the elderly, she said.
"This is my backyard and it's way too close to home. It's so scary and so heartbreaking," she said.
Darlene said over the past 24 hours, members of the Black community in Buffalo have shared their anger and frustration, calling the shooting a "reality check."
"I need white people to wake up," said Darlene, who is also the founder of the Niagara-based Justice 4 Black Lives.
"We're tired of you telling us that we're in your thoughts. We're tired of you feeling sorry for us. What we want you to do is acknowledge that white supremacy is the biggest threat in this country today."
The Rachel Notley government's consumer carbon tax wound up becoming a weapon the UCP wielded to drum the Alberta NDP out of office. But that levy-and-repayment program, and the wide-ranging "climate leadership plan" around it, also stood as the NDP's boldest, provincial-reputation-altering move in their single-term tenure.