A Montreal man faces serious criminal charges in connection with an online video in which a person disguised as the Joker promises to kill Muslims and Arabs in Quebec.
The video shows a man dressed like Heath Ledger’s Joker from “The Dark Knight,” with a cut-out mask over his face, vowing to kill Arabs in retaliation for last week’s terror attacks in Paris.
“I will shoot an Arab in the head, once each week, starting next week,” the man says in the video. He adds that he has a gang of “more than 10 Quebecers” who will be doing the same.
The man holds what appears to be a black pistol. He cocks the weapon at one point, revealing an orange cap on the end of the barrel, which is typically attached to toy guns.
The Surete du Quebec confirmed on Tuesday they were investigating the video, and made an arrest in north Montreal Wednesday morning. A toy gun was recovered at the scene.
Jesse Pelletier, 24, has been charged with uttering death threats, incitement of hatred and perpetrating a terror hoax.
“He is definitely out of himself because he has never been in jail,” Pelletier’s lawyer, Audrey Amzallag, told reporters on Wednesday. “He has a son at home. He has a wife at home.
“He’s definitely scared of what’s going to happen.”
The video was posted online under the name Jack Napier, the alias of the Joker in 1989’s “Batman,” directed by Tim Burton.
Pelletier’s mother-in-law, Chantal Plante, said she thought the video was made as a joke. She described Pelletier as a good husband and father of an 11-month-old boy. But she alleged he was “a bit racist.”
At one point in the video, a young child’s squeal can be heard in the background.
The Joker threat is one of several anti-Muslims incidents that have occurred in Canada in recent days, in the wake of a co-ordinated terror attack in Paris.
A mosque in Dorval received a threatening phone call on Tuesday night, according to the mosque’s president.
“The lady said, ‘We don’t want Muslims in Quebec. We are going to look after you. We hate you and we are going to do something,’” the mosque’s president, Mehmet Deger, told CTV Montreal.
In recent days, a woman in hijab was attacked in Toronto, a mosque in Peterborough, Ont., was burned, and the windows of a Hindu temple in Kitchener were smashed.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned the incidents as “highly disturbing acts” in a statement issued on Wednesday.
“These vicious and senseless acts of intolerance have no place in our country and run absolutely contrary to Canadian values of pluralist and acceptance,” Trudeau said in the statement. “Our focus must be on stopping the people responsible for the terror, and continuing to fight hate by embracing Canadian values.”
With files from CTV Montreal
