The news that Travis Baumgartner was arrested last night in connection with the armed robbery and shootings early Friday morning in HUB Mall brings a sense of relief to all of us in the University of Alberta community. We hope this can begin the healing process for all of us who have been affected by these tragic events.
The show of support and offers of assistance that have poured in from within the university and across Canada has been impressive and much appreciated. Among the calls and emails that we have received are several from those wishing to make donations in honour of the victims.
G4S, the security firm employer of Michelle Shegelski, Brian Ilesic, Eddie Rejano and Matthew Schuman, has established a trust fund to assist their families. Any TD Bank branch in Canada will accept donations to the trust fund. Simply ask the TD Bank branch to mark your donation to “the families of the victims of the University of Alberta Edmonton shooting.”
Students seeking support or counseling can do so in several ways:
Lister Centre 24 hours until 5 a.m. Monday
Chaplain’s office, HUB Mall, daily 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Mental Health Centre/University Health Centre, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday-Friday
Staff seeking support or counseling should contact HPaWS at 2-7124 or hpaws@ualberta.ca.
Thanks to everyone who has shown support for the university in these last few days.
Sincerely,
Carl Amrhein
Acting President; Provost and Vice-President (Academic)
Given the information provided by Mr. Himmelspeck this morning, the need for this group has been set aside by G4S stepping up to do it.
ReplyDeletePlease make any donations you can to any branch of the TD Bank in Canada in the manner as is suggested by University of Alberta Provost Carl Amrhein below.
Although I question, on civil legal grounds, the propriety of G4S collecting and controlling the dispersement of any funds collected from the public when they are a party to the killings (any lawyer who fails to name G4S as a Defendant in a lawsuit is as negligent as G4S was in providing the suspect with a uniform and a gun) I am content NOT to engage in duelling charities and considering the personal costs of me and others setting up a charity, I am somewhat relieved it has been done.
My first FaceBook posts at about 7:25AM Friday morning said:
Lawrence A. Oshanek
This story is particularly sad as the armoured truck employees of this particular company are told it is company policy to give up their money bags without getting engaged in any weapons fight ... I strongly suspect that none of them even drew their weapons to defend themselves and were pre-emptively killed by a very dangerous murderer.
My sincere condolences for all of those in any way touched by this senseless tragedy and I encourage the public to realize that armoured truck guards are not that well paid or covered by any sort of adequate insurance policy ... I further encourage any Edmonton based advocacy group or even a bank to start a fund raising campaign for the families (and children) of those who were so unjustly murdered.
My prayers are with the victims and their families.
Friday at 07:27 · Like · 1
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Lawrence A. Oshanek
Marie Aitken in Calgary answered a question I had in my mind, she said:
"Employees of this company don't usually travell in groups of four to do ATM's so I would assume this was probably a training mission and therefore some of the victims were also new to their jobs. So sad and senseless...." [end quote]
The families of those killed will need our financial support. We came out large for Slave Lake just a year ago and we can come out large for the children of these victims.
It is the least we can do so please keep that in your minds.
Friday at 10:01 · Like · 4
https://www.facebook.com/groups/162110873922465/?bookmark_t=group
Thank you for your comment Mr. Oshanek. Just to be clear, the university did not plan to establish a fund of its own--there are a number of Canada Revenue Agency reasons we could not--and we have always referred people to the fund established by G4S. Dr. Amrhein's post said: "G4S, .... has established a trust fund to assist their families." Again, thank you for your thoughtful comment.
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