Former student killed in stabbing, suspect apprehended at Kelvin High School

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This article was published 02/06/2015 (3823 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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A lunch-hour stabbing at Kelvin High School on Tuesday left one teen dead and another in custody.

Sources have identified former Kelvin student Brett Bourne as the victim in the attack, which happened on school grounds around 12:30 p.m. near the Crescentwood school’s southeast doors.

The Winnipeg Police Service would only say Tuesday afternoon that a stabbing had occurred, a person was taken to the hospital with serious injuries and an individual was in custody.

Other sources Tuesday said the boy died.

Winnipeg police will release more information at 11 a.m. about what they are now calling a homicide.

Winnipeg School Division board chair Mark Wasyliw confirmed a death had occurred, but that the division had not released the names of either the victim or the suspect.

“No names have been given to me,” said Wasyliw, who emphasized that he wants to be sure of his facts before saying anything publicly.

“There’s very little information,” he said, Wednesday morning.

“It has been confirmed to me (Tuesday night) that a death occurred, that the victim had succumbed to his injuries. We have not released any statement on the relationship of these people to our school.”

Wasyliw said that the incident did occur on school property, at the east side doors facing Stafford Street.

Counsellors were in the school Tuesday afternoon and will be there again this morning.

“Today we’re going to have the school open,” and will conduct classes in as normal a manner as possible — which has been the strategy usually used by schools when a tragedy occurs to a student or staff member, he said.

On Tuesday afternoon, several students described hearing a fight break out inside the school between Bourne and another young man, described as a Kelvin student, and then seeing the victim stumble outside and fall to the ground.

Jack Syverson, 16, saw the end of the fight. From a car parked on Kingsway Avenue, less than a block from the scene, Syverson saw the teen fall.

“I just thought he got knocked out, just with a punch,” Syverson said. “… he tried to get up, and just collapsed.”

Crowded around the victim was a group of students, Syverson said, “just talking, panicking.”

Syverson said a series of Kelvin teachers came out quickly, one calling an ambulance and another starting chest compressions. He said the victim showed a teacher the wound, although Syverson couldn’t see a weapon.

For Syverson, it was surreal.

“I kind of felt a little sick,” he recalled. “I just never thought it would happen to a guy our age.”

Syverson once played football with the victim and remembers him as a “good guy”.

“He was nice, he was friendly,” Syverson said. “I had nothing wrong with him, nothing bad to say about him.”

Grade 9 student Sophia Vodniza said she was returning to school after lunch when she saw teachers hunched over the youth, giving him CPR.

“It was kind of scary. When I came back, I didn’t want to go back to school,” because of the panicked atmosphere, she said. The victim was no longer a Kelvin student, reportedly leaving the school last year without graduating.

Some of the teen’s former classmates suggested the fight involved a long-standing dispute between the victim and the other teen involved.

The school was locked down briefly with no one allowed in or out. The lockdown remained in effect until about 2 p.m. as police surrounded the area with yellow caution tape and blocked traffic in all directions.

An 18-year-old student said the lockdown prompted her and a group of students to crowd into the corner of a library and huddle there for about 20 minutes.

“It didn’t feel real,” she said.

Her 17-year-old friend said the emergency was shocking and “really confusing.” About to graduate, the Grade 12 student said it was disappointing “to leave on such a sad note, everything was disorganized.”

When classes ended for the day, students emerging from the school expressed shock and grief as rumours swirled about what had happened.

“It was really tense,” said Hannah Jones-Waterman, 15, a Grade 9 student. “Everybody kept talking about it, everyone was panicking, no one really knew what was going on.”

Grade 12 student Michael Byun said he was inside helping with the school election when his girlfriend texted him that she had seen a teen boy bleeding and “mass panic ensued.”

“You kind of have to expect it going in and you have to be aware that you are potentially getting into some dangerous situations if you’re dealing with the wrong people,” Byun said.

Bourne was “just an average guy” who liked playing soccer, said Julian Avila. Avila, a Grade 11 student at Glenlawn Collegiate, said he and Bourne went to middle school together and he was hit hard by the news that his childhood friend was stabbed.

“(It’s) really scary, obviously,” he said. “My best wishes go out to him and his family.”

Other students were unfazed as they watched the police investigation unfold in front of the school during the lockdown, texting friends inside to let them know they were OK.

The Winnipeg School Division issued a statement about the “unfortunate incident” Tuesday afternoon.

“Kelvin High School staff immediately took steps to ensure the safety of students and 911 was called,” it read.

Winnipeg School Division trustee Sherri Rollins praised the staff at Kelvin for handling the crisis.

“I would like to commend the school community and professional staff who on any given day do incredible work and — on this day — responded admirably, above and beyond what anyone could be asked to do.”

She said education officials will try to learn from the tragedy.

“In the coming days and weeks, we will look to see if more could have been done and — more importantly — if there is anything further we can do to prevent such tragedies in the future.”

 

— with files from Aidan Geary, Jessica Botelho-Urbanski and Nick Martin

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca