CANADA POLICE: MOTIVE UNKNOWN IN KILLINGS OF 11

Police in Canada said Thursday they may never know why a man went on a stabbing rampage that left 11 people dead and 17 injured last year.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police released details at a news conference on the Sept. 4 killings in James Smith Cree Nation and the nearby Saskatchewan village of Weldon, but they did not pin down the motive.

Myles Sanderson, the 32year-old accused in the attacks, died in police custody a few days later.

Superintendent Joshua Graham, the officer in charge of major crimes, said Myles Sanderson and his brother Damien Sanderson went to the James Smith Cree Nation to deal drugs on Sept. 1.

The day before the massacre, Damien Sanderson told people at a nearby bar they had a “mission to do” and that “people would hear all about it in the next few hours.” Damien Sanderson, however, was one of the first people killed the morning of the rampage.

Assistant Commissioner Rhonda Blackmore, commanding officer of the Saskatchewan RCMP, said since both Myles and Damian Sanderson are dead “some of the pieces of information may never be known.”

“To speak to exactly their mindset and what they were thinking, we can’t necessarily address that,” Blackmore said.

After the brothers attacked a man in his home with scissors, Myles Sanderson and Damien Sanderson got into a fight in a vehicle. An injured Damien Sanderson fled the vehicle into the trees along the side of the road. His body would be located there the following day.

Myles Sanderson continued to go to different homes in the community, attacking some people and killing others.

On Sept. 9, after a threeday manhunt and hundreds of reported sightings, police arrested Myles Sanderson on a highway near Rosthern, Saskatchewan. He went into medical distress soon after he was placed in custody and died.

Police say that after nearly eight months, the investigation into the stabbing rampage continues.