Crime and street disorder have become a key political issue in British Columbia amid a series of violent stranger attacks and other public safety incidents. Here are some of events that have made the issue prominent with the public.
Sept. 10, 2023: Three people are stabbed at a community festival in Vancouver’s Chinatown. Blair Donnelly is charged with aggravated assault for the attacks. He had previously been found not criminally responsible for stabbing his teenage daughter to death in 2006 and was on an unescorted pass from a forensic psychiatric hospital — despite having been found to pose a “significant threat” — when the attack occurred.
Nov. 4, 2023:High-risk sex offender Randall Hopley walks away from a halfway house in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, spending 10 days at large before turning himself in to police. Hopley had been released to live in the halfway house in 2018 on a 10-year supervision order but was arrested in …