He ‘never harmed anyone,’ says family of man shot by Peel cops
Just hours after suicide bombers and gunmen terrorized Paris, Peel police officers were called to a quiet neighbourhood in east Mississauga, where they encountered a man wearing what police believed to be an explosive vest.
The bomb squad was called in, the area was cordoned off and the incident ended when Peel police shot the man — identified through court documents as Hamza Abdi — and took him to hospital.
Abdi, a 26-year-old originally from Somalia, is now out of hospital and in jail, facing charges that include a weapons offence for carrying an imitation explosive vest and uttering threats.
His family, however, says he is far from a suicide bomber; he is a mentally ill man diagnosed with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and anxiety.
They also maintain that he was not wearing anything that looked like an explosive vest.
On the night of the shooting, they say Abdi wandered out from the family’s townhouse around midnight, likely to find cigarettes. He was wearing a black coat and — for some unknown reason — he was carrying an electric shaver.
His family, who moved to Canada in 1995, fears he was off his medication, and is concerned the incident unfairly paints Abdi as a terrorist when he is simply sick.
“My brother is mentally ill. He has never harmed anyone,” Rana Abdi, Hamza’s sister, said in an interview at the family’s home Tuesday, about 500 metres from the site of the shooting.
“My brother does not have any sympathies with any terror group, not at all,” said Abdi’s older brother, Mohamoud.
The province’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU), which probes deaths or serious injuries involving police, is now investigating the incident.
Neither the SIU nor Peel police, however, would comment on the details of Abdi’s shooting when contacted by the Star on Tuesday, citing the ongoing investigation.
According to the SIU, Peel police were called to the area of Golden Orchard Dr. and Grand Forks Rd. in east Mississauga at about 1 a.m. Sat- urday. It’s not clear who called police or what alerted officers to Abdi’s presence in the neighbourhood.
The force’s bomb squad was also called to the scene, said Peel police Const. George Tudos.
Sometime after police arrived, Abdi was shot. According to the family, officers fired four times, striking Abdi twice.
Mohamoud Abdi said he left the house not long after his younger brother walked out the door and saw police. Mohamoud claims police told him he could not go any closer because they were investigating an active crime scene. Mohamoud Abdi says the bomb squad was on scene for nearly two hours. After that, his brother was taken to hospital.
“When I saw him at the hospital at 4 a.m. he was shaking, jerking. He was conscious. He knew that when he was on the ground that he was bleeding. He said he was scared that he was going to bleed to death. He said he was cold. It was like he had hypothermia at the hospital,” Mohamoud Abdi said.
Abdi was discharged from hospital Sunday and is being held in the Maplehurst Correctional Complex, his family said.
Court documents show Abdi has been charged with carrying an imitation weapon, defined as “an explosive vest, for a purpose dangerous to the public peace” and also charged with two counts of uttering death threats to two Peel police officers.
In addition, he’s charged with failing to comply with recognizance orders related to an August 2014 charge. That charge, possession of a knife, is still before the courts.
Abdi’s shooting occurred just hours after the attacks in Paris that killed 129 people and injured hundreds more.
Peel police did not respond Tuesday when asked if additional security protocols were in place at the time of Abdi’s shooting in response to the Paris attacks.
Abdi’s siblings said they wanted to speak out about the incident in an attempt to explain their brother’s illness. They are afraid the representation of him as a terrorist could cause significant problems for him and the family.
“I’m telling you this story because it’s the truth,” said Mohamoud Abdi. “This has really torn up my whole family because of what has already been reported about my brother. What are people going to think about us?”
Four investigators and two forensic investigators from the SIU continue to investigate the shooting.