Canada Border Services Agency alerts guards to look out for wanted Maine gunman

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This article was published 26/10/2023 (904 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Canada Border Services Agency issued Thursday an “armed and dangerous” alert to officers stationed along the Canada-U.S. border, warning them to be on the lookout for the man suspected of fatally shooting 18 people in southern Maine.

The shootings were reported Wednesday night in Lewiston, about 260 kilometres southwest of the New Brunswick border.

A police bulletin identified the suspect as 40-year-old Robert Card, a firearms instructor believed to be in the U.S. Army Reserve and assigned to a training facility in Saco, Maine.

As a massive search continued for Card, residents of southern Maine were told to lock their doors and remain inside.

The CBSA said it was working with Canadian and U.S. law enforcement partners, including U.S. Customs and Border Protection and RCMP to “protect Canada’s borders against any threat or attempt at illegal entry.”

The Canadian border agency said its “Armed and Dangerous – Firearms lookout” alert was sent to all its officers through an internal system, and the agency added that all entry points along the Canada-U.S. border remain open.

In Calais, Maine, which shares three border entry points in and near St. Stephen in southwestern New Brunswick, U.S. officers have set up checkpoints on the American side to screen vehicles before they enter Canada, said Allan MacEachern, the mayor of St. Stephen.

Normally, vehicles headed into New Brunswick aren’t checked until they reach the CBSA entry point on the Canadian side.

“We also have officers set up on the Canadian side,” MacEachern said in an interview. “We also alerted the community through our alert app system … I’ve witnessed that setup before for other things.”

Meanwhile, the horror of the shootings was reverberating in Nova Scotia, where residents were recalling how a man disguised as a Mountie fatally shot 22 people three years ago, the worst mass shooting in modern Canadian history.

On Facebook, Nova Scotia resident Nick Beaton posted an image of Maine’s coat of arms. Beaton’s 33-year-old pregnant wife, Kristen, was shot to death on April 19, 2020, as she sat in her car in Debert, N.S.

In response to Beaton’s post, Jennifer Zahl Bruland posted images of three broken hearts. Her father and stepmother — John Zahl and Joanne Thomas — were shot in their retirement home in Portapique, N.S., on the night of April 18, 2020.

The public inquiry that investigated the Nova Scotia murders determined that the shooter, Gabriel Wortman, had smuggled three semi-automatic guns from Maine. Two were handguns he obtained from a friend in Houlton, Maine, and the third was a rifle he bought with the help of a U.S. citizen attending a gun show in Maine.

The final report from the public inquiry, released in March of this year, described how red flags about the killer failed to stop any of his illegal activities during his 21 border crossings between Woodstock, N.B., and Houlton between 2016 and 2020.

In New Brunswick, the RCMP issued a brief statement Thursday saying the police force was monitoring the situation in collaboration with Canadian and U.S. partners.

“Our thoughts are with the citizens of Maine, and everyone affected by this event,” RCMP Cpl. Hans Ouellette said in the statement.

Maine shares 18 official entry points with New Brunswick, and another six with Quebec, according to CBSA’s website.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 26, 2023.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version said 22 people had been fatally shot in Lewiston.