MONTREAL -- Mayor Valerie Plante has had enough of handguns.
After three people were shot in less than 12 hours, Plante on Tuesday urged Ottawa to pass stricter gun control laws.
"We have to send a strong message that here in Canada a handgun is not something that you can just get anywhere. I want us to stand strong and talk loud about how Canada is a safe place, Quebec is a safe place, Montreal is a safe place," she said.
On Monday afternoon, a case of road rage turned violent, and one driver shot another, police said. A 23-year-old delivery truck driver is recovering from a gunshot wound to the upper body.
In the evening, gunfire echoed in a Dorval parking lot, injuring a 25-year-old man. He didn't know why the shooter targeted him, he told police.
And finally, just before midnight, in the East end, police rushed to the scene of another shooting. They found an unconscious 24-year-old man with upper-body injuries.
Officers are investigating the three shootings, but investigators have no reason to think they are related, SPVM spokesperson Caroline Chevrefils on Tuesday told CTV News. No arrests have been made. Chevrefils said she was not in a position to speculate as to why there had been so many shootings on Monday.
Montreal police have refused to say whether the Montreal area is witnessing more shootings in 2019 than in past years. Toronto, by contrast, keeps public data on the number of shootings--which have noticeably climbed in 2019.
"Toronto is dealing with a crisis over there and we want to avoid that. Montreal is a secure city, we want to keep it that way," Plante said.
She urged Justin Trudeau's Liberal government to move ahead with promised gun control legislation. Trudeau pledged to allow cities to ban handguns--but some have criticized that merely symbolic.
With files from CTV Montreal's Rob Lurie
