SAINT-JEAN-SUR-RICHELIEU, Quebec, (Reuters) – Canadian police said yesterday they had arrested a suspected militant as he was leaving the country, took away his passport and talked to him several times but had no chance of preventing him from killing a soldier.
Martin Rouleau, a 25-year-old who converted to Islam last year, rammed his car into two soldiers in the Quebec town of Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu on Monday and was shot dead by police. A 53-year-old adjutant died in the attack.
The incident, the first fatal attack on Canadian soil tied to Islamic militants, occurred after Canada announced this month it was joining the battle against Islamic State fighters who have taken over parts of Iraq and Syria.
Rouleau was among 90 people being tracked by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) on suspicion of taking part in militant activities abroad or planning to do so.
Martine Fontaine, the RCMP official who is responsible for national security matters in Quebec, said police had never come up with enough evidence to lay charges against Rouleau and could not have predicted the attack.
“We can’t arrest somebody for having radical thoughts. It’s not a crime in Canada,” she told a news conference in Montreal.
