Presto | 01-02-2015 01:39 PM | Victims ID'd, and more details: Quote:
Edmonton Police have named the eight victims of the city's worst mass murder in recent history. They also confirmed that they were shot and killed by Phu Lam, 53.
The victims are: - Thuy-Tien Truong, 35, partner of Phu Lam
- Elvis Lam, 8, son of Thuy-Tien Truong
- Thanh Ha Thi Truong, 33, sister of Thuy Tien Truong
- Valentina Nguyen, 3, daughter of Thuy Tien Truong
- Thi Dau Le, 55, mother of Thuy Tien and Thanh Ha Thi Truong
- Van Dang Truong, 55, estranged husband of Thi Dau Le and father of Thuy Tien and Thanh Ha Thi Truong
- Viet Nguyen, 41, friend of Thuy Tien Truong
- Cyndi Duong, 37. Police believe she was not the intended victim of the shooter
Earlier on Friday, court documents showed that Phu Lam, the man believed responsible for last week's mass shooting, threatened to kill his wife and her whole family in 2012.
His wife gave the testimony in an emergency protection hearing in November 2012.
The documents say that Lam learned through genetic tests that he was not the biological father of his son, who was born in 2006.
His wife said that Lam physically abused and choked her on Nov. 2, 2012, after presenting the DNA results to her parents.
Following a hearing four days later, she was granted an emergency protection order that prevented Lam from going within 200 metres of her parents' home and not to have direct contact with her, her son, her sister and her parents.
In her video testimony, she said Lam planned to kill her whole family two weeks earlier and kept making the threats. He was going to look for a gun, but no one would sell one to him, she said.
She testified through a interpreter that he had abused and choked her several times throughout their marriage; at one point she said she nearly died. He also terrorized her with threats.
"He would threaten her to say that he would give her the phone, tell her to call the cops and then kill her on the spot so when the cops come that they would be there to pick up her body," the interpreter said.
She testified that she wanted to move back with her parents.
The protection order was granted until Nov. 26, but extended into January 2013. The order was revoked when neither Lam nor his wife appeared in court for a review on Jan. 18, 2013, the expiry date on the order.
Lam was charged with assault, sexual assault and seven counts of uttering death threats in November 2012 but the charges were stayed on Dec. 21, 2012. Statements in 2012 case recanted
In a statement, Michelle Doyle, acting assistant deputy minister of the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service, said the prosecutors concluded that there was no reasonable likelihood of conviction after the complainant and witnesses recanted or changed their original statements made to police.
"The Crown opposed Mr. Lam’s release from custody, and his release was denied by a Provincial Court Judge," Doyle said.
"The investigation into these allegations was conducted by members of the Edmonton Police Service. It was thorough and comprehensive. All available supports were offered and made available to the complainants in this matter."
Lam, who was 53 when he died, came to Canada from Vietnam in 1979. He met his wife, who was 18 years younger, on a trip to Vietnam in 2000. The couple married six months later and she came to Canada in 2003. Problems included financial ones
Documents reveal that Lam also had significant financial problems.
He filed for bankruptcy in February 2013 with $365,000 in secured debt and $116,296 in unsecured debt, mostly from more than a dozen credit cards.
Documents list gambling as the cause. Lam completed an intensive gambling recovery program in May 2014.
Six adults, between ages 25 and 50, and two children under age 10 were found in two separate Edmonton homes Monday night and early Tuesday morning.
Lam was found dead of an apparent suicide in a restaurant in Fort Saskatchewan on Tuesday morning.
Seven of the eight victims have not yet been identified by police. But until recently, a boy lived in the home where Lam resided with his wife and their children.
Cyndi Duong, 37, was identified by police as one of the victims, following an autopsy Tuesday.
Autopsies on Lam and the remaining victims were performed Thursday. Police plan to provide an update at 3 p.m. MT.
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