Langley’s mass shooting spree on July 25, 2022, left Steven Furness and Paul Wynn dead, and two others injured. The Langley Advance Times reconnects with victims’ families and first responders on the shooting’s first anniversary.
.
According to Fraser Holland, the multiple murders of July 25, 2022 have left Langley’s homeless population – who usually cluster in groups for safety – feeling even more at risk.
“He [the shooter] definitely shook any faith that [homeless] people might have had in their safety on the street. I mean streets aren’t safe to begin with, it’s always that there’s always strength in numbers. But you know, in at least one of the instances on July 25, it was a group that attracted the shooter.”
Holland, chair of the Langley housing and homeless action table, who has been working with homeless people for years, said there is, unfortunately, nothing new about violence directed at the homeless.
“But, this is a whole different level of violence that can’t do anything but just really emphasize the vulnerability of an individual when they don’t even have tent walls around them.”
They are too often targets, he said.
”I have heard more than enough stories of people being trapped in the [trash] bins when they’re going through them looking for recycling or whatever, and when they come out, they get beat up.”
READ ALSO: VIDEO: Homeless say Langley shootings are escalation of harassment they already endure
While the bulk of the shootings that day were of homeless people, Holland isn’t sure it means that the homeless were being targeted.
“They might have been the easiest people to find,” he commented, noting at least one victim was housed at the time.
Asked what needs to be done, Holland said providing more opportunities for people to be off the street “whether that is creating housing or creating shelter spaces, whatever that looks like.”
Better community services are needed, he insisted, “so people aren’t struggling with their mental health when they’re on the street.”
The tragedy, he said, “impacts me professionally. It impacts me personally. Nobody deserves that.”
Holland knew one of the victims, Paul David Wynn, who died outside Creek Stone Place, a supportive housing project for formerly homeless people.
They had known each other going back about 25 years, he estimated.
“You start growing up and go your separate ways,” he recalled.
“It wasn’t until I started working in Langley [homeless] outreach that I ran into Paul again,” he told the Langley Advance Times.
”After I got over the initial emotion of what had happened on July 25, the grief, the anger, the sadness, I started thinking about in 2015 when another homeless individual was murdered, Wells Gallagher, by another individual, who at the time was homeless,” Holland said.
A judge later ruled that the killer, David Van Den Brink, could not be convicted of second-degree murder, because he was suffering from a mental disorder – schizophrenia.
READ ALSO: Langley homeless man who stabbed another man in 2015 not criminally responsible
• Stay tuned for more
Have a story tip? Email: dan.ferguson@langleyadvancetimes.com
Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.